June 27, 2003	Friday	Rabi-us-Sani 26,1424

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RAWALPINDI, June 26: Protests and walkouts over uneven distribution of development funds marked the proceedings of the Tehsil Council session here on Thursday.

As the session started, some members including those from the rural areas complained of discrimination in the distribution of development funds. They also complained that they were not consulted about the works done in their areas. This created an uproar in the House, and the members started raising slogans against each other — some favouring the Nazim, others opposing him. They also exchanged hot words.

The supporters of the Nazim protested against what they said the unparliamentary language used against the latter and walked out of the House. They demanded unconditional apology from the members who used unparliamentary language against the Nazim. We will come to the House only when they apologise to the Nazim, they said.

After a break of about half an hour, the protesting members came back to the hall. The House was tense for some time but Speaker Sajjad Khan controlled the situation. He explained to the members that they could differ in their views but none would be allowed to use unparliamentary language in the House.

Respect of the House is the responsibility of every member, he told them and asked Ch Ijaz Anwar from Sihal to apologise for his controversial remarks against the Nazim. The situation normalised after he apologised and the House resumed proceedings.

Another member from Union Council 26, Assad Mughal, accused the Tehsil Nazim of instigating the councillors of his constituency for a no-trust motion against him. “They passed a resolution against me at 11.30 at night at the behest of the Nazim,” he alleged. Mr Mughal attended the session on a court stay.

Some of the members supported the franchise transport system and demanded that more transport companies be allowed to operate buses and all the routes be franchised to them.

After all this hullabaloo was over, the House started discussion on the agenda. It passed a resolution about schedule of changes in the tehsil administration establishment and raised objections to some contracts, which the TMA had auctioned off about a week ago. These contracts were Chani Alamsheer Cattle Show worth about Rs8.2 million, Pirwadhai general bus stand contract, wagon stand, Suzuki stand, car parking fee, transfer of property tax, public park entry fee and Raniyal cattle fair. The members did not approve the contracts for lack of details, terms and conditions on the basis of which these were auctioned off.