LAHORE: The Punjab Assembly collapsed twice to the quorum crisis on Friday in a short span of less than two hours proceedings though the Treasury was able to meet the number game on both occasions.

Deputy Speaker Dost Muhammad Mazari also must have set a new tradition as, after the second quorum call, he kept instructing the Treasury to bring members sitting in the lobbies to the House and then waited for the members to sneak in before ordering counting.

No one reminded the young parliamentarian from the south that he was custodian of the House, not of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI).

“This is immaturity mixed with loyalty,” someone quipped in the press gallery. The Speaker’s instructions, however, worked and the cabinet members, led by Raja Basharat – the minister for law and parliamentary affairs – scrabbled outside to bring members in the House and meet the figure of 93 required for the proceedings.

The House, supposed to debate the all-important budget for the current fiscal, suffered a jolt from outset when the Opposition refused to join the proceedings in protest against suspension of its members which the Speaker had ordered for hooliganism on the budget day.

The Treasury only made situation bad for itself when Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Raja Basharat stood up to not only endorse the suspension on behalf of the ‘entire House’ but also demanded the chair to form a parliamentary committee for fixing the responsibility for the damages, which he put at Rs0.9m, done on the day and also recover the money from those found guilty.

In absence of the Opposition, the entire debate on budget was reduced to “cursing financial sins and corrupt practices of the previous government and eulogy for the vision of the prime minister”.

Led by Uzma Kardar, the Treasury members were all praise for the “vision of the chairman and how young provincial minister for finance has been able to reflect that human development vision it the budget document”. They counseled patience to those bemoaning price hike and other problems, saying that the people must also realise that these are small and temporary problems – necessary for the betterment of the country.

The five members who spoke on the occasion enjoyed exemption to digress into political areas and berate the PML-N government for bad governance, even, what they termed, worse financial mismanagement that had left Punjab in disastrous situation. This privilege was, however, denied to a member from the remote area of Rahim Yar Khan, bordering Sindh and Balochistan, who thought the new budget had treated them in the old way.

“Funds have again been diverted just as the PML-N was doing. Frequent postings and transfers are still ruining the law and order, citing these transfers in his constituency. He claimed incidents of kidnapping for ransom have also increased,” he was still speaking when the chair interrupted to remind him that it was budget debate and he should not venture into irrelevant matters, like governance and transfers. He, however, insisted he was right in his claims because all the claims about human development had not touched his area where there was no degree college and no funds had been made available in the budget as well.

The six suspended members of the House sat at the main entrance of the assembly building throughout the day to protest their suspension whereas their other colleagues kept protesting inside the assembly premises. All this was still going on when the chair adjourned the session till Monday afternoon.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2018