ISLAMABAD: Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani has summoned the session of the upper house of parliament on Friday on the requisition of members of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and nationalist parties from Balochistan to discuss the prevailing law and order situation in the country ahead of the July 25 general elections.

The requisition notice had been submitted immediately after the prorogation of the session on Monday.

Besides the PML-N members, the senators belonging to the Pakhtun­khwa Milli Awami Party and the National Party had also put their signatures on the requisition notice seeking to call the Senate session on a two-point agenda — discussion on “law and order and political situation in the country”.

Chairman Sanjrani has summoned the session on the call of PML-N and nationalist parties of Balochistan

Under the Senate rules, the chairman is bound to convene the session within 15 days after receiving a requisition notice to be signed by at least one-fourth of the total 104 members of the house.

Sources in the Senate Secretariat said that the session might continue only for one day.

During the previous sitting, the members of both the PML-N and the Pakistan Peoples Party had demanded that the session continue till the general elections so that there could be a parliamentary oversight of the whole electoral process. However, the call for continuing the session was opposed by the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf members who were of the view that the session should be prorogued so that they could participate in the election campaign in their respective constituencies.

Published in Dawn, July 20th, 2018