LAHORE: Rowdyism marred the all-important budget session of the Punjab Assembly on Tuesday, with members of the treasury and opposition coming to blows during the finance minister’s speech.

PA Speaker Pervaiz Elahi issued show-cause notices to six of the PML-N MPAs for what the treasury said attack on the assembly staff and damaging the furniture. He also banned their entry throughout the ongoing budget session.

The charged PML-N MPAs wearing black armbands stood on their seats when the speaker did not allow its member Malik Muhammad Ahmad to speak on a point of order. The speaker said as the finance minister was to present the budget speech, no point of order could be taken before it.

Reacting to it, many opposition members stood on the seats while others came right in front of the speaker’s dais and started chanting slogans against the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government and Prime Minister Imran Khan. The opposition lawmakers forced the assembly staff sitting on the front row to leave the bench for them and even went to the extent of tearing the budget copies which they threw at the treasury members.

The opposition shouted slogans such as ‘Go Imran Go’ and ‘Kuch sharam karo kuch hiya karo Shahbaz Sharif ko riha karo’, making it difficult for Finance Minister Hashim Jawan Bakht to be audible during his speech. Senior Minister Abdul Aleem Khan and Law Minister Basharat Raja stood up in support of Mr Bakht who kept sipping water to maintain poise.

The opposition’s protest took an ugly turn when lawmakers Tariq Masih Gill and Malik Waheed tried to pick up the chair of the assembly staff next to the speaker. This prompted the speaker’s sergeant-at-arms to intervene but the lawmakers shoved him back.

Many PTI MPAs moved forward and this led to a scuffle between the opposition and treasury members. Opposition leader Hamza Shahbaz and senior PTI legislators intervened and stopped their ‘charged’ members. The hullabaloo continued till the finance minister concluded the speech and introduced the Punjab Finance Bill 2018. Pervaiz Elahi issued show-cause notices to six PML-N MPAs for their alleged involvement in “attacking the assembly staff, damaging the furniture and using abusive language about the government” and stopped their entry to the House till conclusion of the budget session. They were Ashraf Rasool, Malik Wahid, Yasin Amir, Mirza Javed, Ms Zaibu Nisa and Tariq Masih Gill.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2018