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KARACHI: A strong backlash over the approval of a controversial bill by a Senate committee to allow the dependent children of ex-legislators to hold blue passports has prompted a sitting minister to publicly distance himself from the legislation.
Politicians, including a senior leader of the ruling PML-N, academics and journalists condemned the proposal as an unjustified expansion of privileges of the parliamentarians, while State Minister Tallal Chaudhry claimed he had opposed the bill during the July 10 proceedings of the Senate committee.
Mr Chaudhry said he had informed the Senate Standing Committee on Interior that the issue should first be discussed with the federal cabinet and other stakeholders. “Despite my reservations, they proceeded to pass the bill,” he wrote on X.
By contrast, the official press statement, released by the Senate Secretariat last week, noted that the state minister had “also agreed on passing of the bill”.
Minister distances himself from controversial bill amid criticism
If enacted as approved by the Senate panel, the legislation would place former members of parliament on par with retired Grade-22 government officers, whose dependent children already enjoy the same entitlement.
Senior PML-N leader Khawaja Saad Rafique criticised the bill, likening it to KP’s recent law granting lawmakers extra privileges, which he said undermines elected bodies.
“People had not yet recovered from the shock of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly approving various privileges, including official blue passports, for current and former assembly members and their families, when a Senate standing committee recommended blue passports for former parliamentarians and their families as well,” he wrote on X.
Historian Ilhan Niaz, a professor at Quaid-i-Azam University, said that all official and diplomatic passports should be eliminated for everyone except for the officials themselves.
“Honour lies in declining privileges, not in exercising them or expanding their scope,” he added in a post on X.
Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2026
