KARACHI, Dec 21: Speakers at a seminar on Sunday said Sindh was being given a step-motherly treatment by the federal government and demanded that the province be given its rights so that the grievances of its people could be redressed.
Speaking at the seminar on “Sindhis: privileged natives or native aliens of the federation,” organized by a non-governmental organization, Dialogue: Pakistan, they said that though Sindh earned a major portion of the revenue, it was given just a fraction of its earnings for its subsistence.
Syed Qurban Ali Shah of the Pakistan People’s Party criticized the government for distributing the funds under the National Finance Commission on the basis of population and demanded that it be done on the basis of contribution of each federating unit. He said the criterion was followed in many countries.
He said the centre was now insisting on giving importance to the population, but it had refused to accept the principle before 1971 and the Bengalis were forced to accept the formula of parity.
He said the Sindh Assembly was the first to adopt the Pakistan Resolution but G.M. Syed, who had presented the resolution and played an important role in its adoption, remained under custody for many decades after the independence.
He said the National Accountability Bureau was being used to victimize the opponents of the government. He demanded that the NAB be made answerable to parliament.
He said the construction of the Thal Canal was started without getting the project passed through the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council or even the Indus River System Authority. He said even the British government had not started the construction of the canal after objections by Sindh.
He said the Pakistan Resolution had mentioned that only defence, foreign affairs, communications and currency would be federal subjects and Quaid-i-Azam had pointed out that the country would be secular. But those important policies had been forgotten, he said.
Former Sindh chief secretary Kunwar Idris said the Centre had been strengthening its grip on the resources and power structure of the provinces.
He was of the view that the parliamentary system had weakened democracy as most of the time the federal authority had taken important decisions about the provinces, particularly Sindh.
He suggested that the provincial cheif executive should be elected directly. He said the present chief minister was not a politically known person before he took the office and such people had been nominated from the Centre.
He said the civil society did not have any chance of winning if it decided to present its case in the streets because the politico-religious groups had more street power.
MPA Dr Hamida Khuhro of the Pakistan Muslim League said the democratic principles had not been observed almost since independence, which led to social and political deterioration.
She said that though Quaid-i-Azam was a democratic person, soon after the independence the elected governments of Sindh and the NWFP were dismissed. She said he handpicked the cabinet and used to chair the cabinet meetings as the governor-general.
She said people at the helm of the affairs could have made the provinces stronger after 1971 but the chance was missed.
Dr Adrian A. Hussain gave a resume of the Dialogue: Pakistan. Columnist Ghazi Salahuddin, Irshad Abdul Kadir, Khursheed Haider and others also spoke.
