KARACHI: The Sindh Assembly session on Tuesday, which was a private members’ day, was adjourned till Friday without taking up any private business from the order of the day after the question hour as the house was informed that lawmakers were keen to visit Dadu to pay tribute to former chief minister Syed Abdullah Shah on his eighth death anniversary.

Pakistan Peoples Party lawmaker from Dadu Kulsoom Chandio drew the attention of the chair about the death anniversary, while Sindh Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Dr Sikander Mandhro said that remaining business on the agenda could be put off to the next working day if the opposition agreed to it.

Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani, who had called the house in order at 10.55am, especially mentioning leader of the opposition Shaharyar Khan Mahar and MQM parliamentary party leader Syed Sardar Ahmad said that if they agreed to adjourn the remaining business till the next private members’ day, a motion could be tabled after taking up the adjournment motion of Pakistan Muslim League-Functional lawmaker Nand Kumar.

Presenting his adjournment motion, Mr Kumar said the house had unanimously passed a resolution to open up wheat procurement centres in the province and making bardana available to growers to sell their wheat crop.

But wheat purchasing centres were not yet open at many places, he said. The location of some centres had been changed, including the one in Umerkot, while bardana was not available to growers.

Dr Mandhro said the wheat procurement centres had been opened across the province and the food minister himself had been visiting every district to see the situation on the ground. He assured the house that such centres would soon be opened wherever they had not been made functional so far to mitigate the difficulties of the growers at the earliest.

After this assurance, the minister agreed to the suggestion of the chair not to press on his motion and withdrew it.

PML-Nawaz lawmaker Liaquat Ali Jatoi, who is also former chief minister, tried to raise the plight of the wheat growers about unavailability of bardana and that the subsidy, which was announced by the government for the growers of sugar cane, and its benefit was not reaching to them.

The speaker reminded the lawmaker that the mover in the light of the assurance given by the minister had withdrawn his adjournment motion. When the motion was put to the house, it was passed unanimously.

The house was later adjourned at 12.20pm till Friday.

Jatoi wants army operation in interior of Sindh

Following the session, PML-N lawmaker Liaquat Ali Jatoi speaking to the media on the steps of the assembly building accused the government of destroying the agriculture sector.

He said sugar cane growers were not benefiting from the Rs12 per maund subsidy and there was apprehension that instead of growers the entire amount of subsidy would be passed on to an individual.

He said when the growers were not even paid the price of sugar cane at the official rate, how could they get benefit of the subsidy.

Mr Jatoi said the benefit of official rate of wheat Rs1,350 per maund was being passed on to PPP lawmakers by handing them over thousands of bags which were being sold to the growers at the rate of Rs300 per bag.

He said people were not prepared to purchase wheat in the open market at the rate of Rs1,100 per maund.

He said lawlessness in the interior of Sindh could be assessed from the fact that all forests in the province were occupied by land grabbers while lawmakers in the assembly were not allowed to raise the issue.

On Monday, he said, a woman lawmaker’s adjournment motion was ruled out of order. It was regarding the closure of 80 per cent tube wells in SCARP area, he added.

He said the only option left was to appeal to the Rangers and the army to carry out an operation without any discrimination across the province so that forests and government land could be freed from their illegal occupants and take measures to restore peace to the province.

Published in Dawn, April 15th, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play