ISLAMABAD: Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani on Monday warned that if provincial autonomy was rolled back, it would spell disaster for the federation.

The chairman Senate said the federation of Pakistan could not afford an aberration or reversal in provincial autonomy.

"Parliament has an important role to play and acting in haste could lead to derailment of democracy. But we must take a sensible approach – that is dialogue and continuation of democracy," he said while speaking at an awards ceremony for Young Parliamentary Associates (YPA), which was organised by Improving Parliamentary performance in Pakistan (IP3) – a project funded by the European Union.

"We are not willing to let young Pakistanis remember that we failed. We will now carry forward where the previous generation left," he remarked.

He said it will be a great service to educate people on how the parliament worked.

Talking to the YPAs, he said, “You must realise that you had a unique opportunity of working at a prestigious and an apex political organisation and witnessed how parliamentarians click.”

Rabbani said youngsters must know and see for themselves that parliamentarians are mere mortals like any other organisation.

The Senate chairman said he took solace in the fact that Pakistan's democracy is in a transitional phase, both in terms of parliamentary democracy as well as growth of the federation, from dictatorship to a democratic dispensation.

“Transitions are painful and time consuming”.