LAHORE: The Punjab Assembly on Tuesday passed a bill restoring the perks and privileges for former chief ministers that had been withdrawn by the Hamza government a few months ago.

The perks, including an official vehicle, reasonable security cover and personal staff, had been granted by the Buzdar government.

PTI MPA Musarrat Jamshed Cheema moved the Punjab Ministers (Salaries, Allowances and Privileges) (Amendment)(Repeal) Bill of 2022 as the opposition PML-N and PPP protested that no copies of the bills were given to them.

Deputy Speaker Wasiq Qayyum Abbasi suspended the relevant rules to allow Ms Cheema to table the bill amid noisy protests and walkouts by the opposition.

The new law will benefit all the former chief ministers.

Opposition members, including Tahir Khalil Sindhu, said they didn’t know what the government passed through the bill as copies of the document were shared neither with them nor the media.

Mr Sindhu claimed that the salaries of cabinet members were also increased from Rs680,000 to Rs1.265 million, as well as enhancing the limits of free petrol and other facilities through the bill.

However, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Raja Basharat denies the claim saying the bill only repealed the clauses related to the withdrawal of security of former chief ministers by [Hamza administration] in the assembly session that had been held outside the assembly building.

The house also passed the Urdu Language Bill, 2022, banning the use of any other script other than Urdu for writing anything in the Urdu language.

The new law is particularly aimed at eradicating the use of the Roman alphabet for writing Urdu documents, messages, etc.

Published in Dawn, October 19th, 2022