A day after Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) emir Sirajul Haq launched a “consensus offensive” aimed at bringing the government and opposition closer, the PTI on Sunday constituted a three-member committee to hold a dialogue “on the ongoing political crisis in the country”.

According to a statement issued today, PTI leaders Pervaiz Khattak, Ejaz Chaudhry, and Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed will hold a dialogue with JI.

The development comes after the JI chief held meetings with PTI Chairman Imran Khan and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif at their residences in Lahore.

During the meetings on Saturday, Haq suggested that a committee should be set up to develop a larger consensus for holding elections in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtun­khwa and eventually the whole country.

Both PM Shehbaz and Imran appreciated Haq’s efforts and assured him of their full cooperation, agreeing that elections were the way forward to pull the country out of prevailing economic, political, and constitutional crises.

Sources in the JI told Dawn that as part of his efforts to bring all parties to the negotiating table, Haq also planned to meet PPP leader Asif Zardari after Eid and expected a breakthrough in the next two weeks.

Earlier this week, former president and PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari also suggested all political parties sit together and develop a consensus on a single date for the elections.

For this purpose, the PPP has formed a three-member body — comprising Senator Yousuf Raza Gillani, Federal Minister for Commerce Syed Naveed Qamar and PM’s Adviser on Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan Qamar Zaman Kaira — to persuade allies in the government to start the process with the Imran-led party.

The main task of the three PPP leaders is to persuade the PML-N and JUI-F to hold talks with PTI on all issues, including elections, to end the ongoing crises.

In the last few days, emphasis has been given to dialogue between all the political parties in the country.

A Dawn editorial today said: “Sit at a table and talk. Break bread together; break the ice. That’s all that the nation needs its key leaders to do. The steep slope that this country has been hurtling down leads only to disaster. Much damage has already been done; there may not be much time left before an all-out catastrophe becomes imminent.”

It also stated that politics involved compromise, adding that “inflexible egos have no place in a democratic political system”.