MUZAFFARABAD: Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) Legislative Assembly on Wednesday approved, with majority vote, a bill giving ‘legal cover’ to advisers to the region’s president and the prime minister.

The one-day session was convened by the government only to enact the bill, namely ‘The Azad Jammu and Kashmir Advisers (Appointment, Salaries, Allowance and Privileges) Act, 2014’, allegedly to frustrate a writ petition filed by two Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leaders in June last year against the ‘unlawful’ appointments of advisers in AJK with ministerial status.

Pertinently, the AJK’s Interim Constitution Act 1974 has no mention of advisers of the president or the prime minister, except for a plebiscite adviser. However, this position was created by adding section 6-A in the Rules of Business 1985. Since then, successive governments have been appointing advisers with a ministerial status.

Law Minister Syed Azhar Hussain Gillani read out the report of the concerned selection committee, saying that there will be two advisers with the president and four with the prime minister, including a senior adviser and a special assistant, who will perform such functions which may be assigned to them by the president or the prime minister.The bill, he said, would take retrospective effect to protect the already appointed advisers.

However, when the law minister sought a vote on the bill, several opposition members, including leader of the opposition Raja Farooq Haider, stood up and voiced serious objections and apprehensions about the law.

They maintained that there was no need to enact the bill at the moment, when the AJK high court had completed hearings on the issue of appointment of advisers and was about to announce its judgment.

The government had introduced the bill with mala fide intentions for the sake of a Faisalabad resident, the opposition lawmakers alleged, referring to Chaudhry Riaz, a confidant of MNA Faryal Talpur, who was appointed by Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed as his adviser in December last year.

The opposition regretted the fact that while the ruling Peoples Party had agreed for inclusion of only two advisers in the proposed constitutional amendments for AJK, it had favoured the appointment of six advisers.

However, the treasury refused to subscribe to the opposition’s standpoint, saying advisers were appointed by every government in the past and the sitting government had just given them a legal cover.

The opposition then staged a walkout in protest and the bill was passed in their absence.

Earlier, the house witnessed disturbance during the question hour, after Speaker Sardar Ghulam Sadiq and opposition Muslim Conference lawmaker Sardar Sayab Khalid exchanged unpleasant remarks in a fit of rage and emotion.

The rumpus became so intense that the speaker had to adjourn the session for some time. During question hour, the house was informed that last year Rs294.35 million Zakat had been deducted out of the budget, out of which Rs144.41 million were spent on administrative expenditures, Rs1.88 million on provision of loans to the employees and the rest on aid and assistance of the needy through Zakat committees, educational, health institutions and seminaries etc.

Published in Dawn, June 19th, 2014