ISLAMABAD, March 26: An outspoken ally stunned the government on Friday as he attacked its vows about transparency by telling the National Assembly that he had traced 40,000 bogus votes in one constituency where he had lost in the last elections.

Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT) chief Mohammad Tahirul Qadri said it took him 10 months to find the allegedly bogus entries in the NA-89 constituency of Jhang in the Punjab province through a computerized exercise and promised to resign his seat in the National Assembly if he were proved wrong.

He had brought three books of record of alleged bogus entries in that constituency's electoral rolls where he said same voters were listed up to eight times - most of them twice - and demanded an inquiry by a house committee before holding by-elections there.

Dr Qadri, who had won from the NA-127 constituency of Lahore in the October 2002 polls but lost in Jhang to the late Maulana Mohammad Azam Tariq, used the continuing debate on President Pervez Musharraf's January 17 speech to a joint session of parliament to fire shots at his own coalition government for the second day running.

On Thursday, Dr Qadri criticized Pakistan's alliance in the US-led war against terrorism during a debate on the current military operations in the South Waziristan tribal agency to hunt suspected foreign militants and their local harbourers.

Maulana Tariq, who was elected as an independent candidate but later joined hands with the government, was a former chief of banned Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan group. He was killed by unknown gunmen outside Islamabad last year.

The assaults on the government by Dr Qadri, who is a well-known Islamic scholar, came after Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali began a promised expansion of his cabinet by inducting another coalition ally, Pakistan Muslim League-Zia chief Ejazul Haq as a minister on Tuesday.

There was no information whether Dr Qadri was or still is an aspirant for a cabinet slot. Mr Ejazul Haq appeared to have accepted the religious affairs portfolio despite his reported reservations as he spoke in that capacity on Friday to assure the house - on a call-attention notice by five members - that he would try to further improve arrangements for Haj next year.

Another member on the treasury benches, Mian Riaz Pirzada (Punjab) from former president Farooq Khan Leghari's National Alliance, supported Dr Qadri's demand for an inquiry and said he had also been a victim of similar manipulations.

Dr Qadri demanded appearance of the chief election commissioner and the Punjab provincial election commissioner before the proposed house committee to answer charges why they failed to remedy the situation despite a vote count revising authority's suggestion for deleting all multiple vote entries.

He accused the election authorities of being party to the alleged vote-rigging to help what he called terrorism and called them "national criminals".

MASS SUICIDE THREAT: Before the house was adjourned until 4.30pm on Monday, Women Development Adviser Neelofar Bakhtiar said Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali had asked the Sindh provincial government to hold an immediate inquiry into a press report that 18 financially hard-pressed women had decided to commit a mass suicide before the Quaid-i-Azam's mausoleum in Karachi.