LAHORE: The issue of alleged allotment of an expensive industrial plot by the Faisalabad Industrial Estate Development & Management Company (FIEDMC) chairman to himself was raised in the Punjab Assembly when it met here on Monday.

None other than Speaker Malik Muhammad Ahmed Khan raised the point during the Question Hour, wherein the industries department was under discussion, asking parliamentary secretary Hasan Askri if FIEDMC chairman Mian Anas Jan has the authority to allot the most expensive plot at the industrial estate to himself.

Mr Askri replied in the negative, saying the plot allotment required a certain procedure.

The speaker then advised him to check with the department the plot allotment procedure, and suggested that Mian Anas should get salary as the FIEDMC chief, instead of serving on an honorary basis, and should avoid laying claim on expensive plots in the industrial estate.

A PPP lawmaker from Rahim Yar Khan, Mumtaz Chang, complained that two big fertilizer factories in Asia, located in his district, were polluting the subsoil water, resulting in a change in its taste.

He demanded that the area, where seven sugar mills were also operating, be saved from the bad practice of releasing untreated hazardous waste into the water channels in the area, polluting the vital source of drinking and irrigation water.

Mr Chang, while moving a call-attention notice, threatened to resign as lawmaker if no action was taken against the “corrupt” police officers posted in the Katcha (riverine) area in the RYK district despite “solid evidence” against them.

He said the legislators did not come to the house to pass their time, adding that they should become the voice of their people. He regretted that some people want to save the black sheep in the police department.

“People were kidnapped from my constituency, and two of them were injured by dacoits of the Katcha area, while the police department presented false reports in the house about police action against unscrupulous elements,” he said.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman introduced the Punjab Agricultural Income Tax (amendment) Bill 2024 in the house, which was referred to the relevant standing committee with the direction of submitting its report on it within two months.

The house earlier offered fateha for the deceased wife of MPA Javed Niaz Manj and those martyred in the Quetta Railway Station suicide attack.

Published in Dawn, November 12th, 2024