LAHORE, Oct 4: Punjab Assembly Speaker Afzal Sahi on Thursday accepted 44 resignations of 47 members, who resigned two days ago but issued notices to three members of the provincial assembly (MPAs) to “explain their position”.

The assembly secretariat issued a notification naming the members who have been de-seated. Those who have been asked to ‘explain’ their positions include: Akram Gujjar, Khalid Kalyar and Amer Sahotra.

The opposition cried foul at non-acceptance of the three resignations, saying that those MPAs were being pressured to withdraw their resignations. The three members defected from the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) to the PML-Nawaz.

“No one knows why the speaker has not accepted the resignations of the three MPAs and accepted of other three members who also defected from the ruling party to the PML-N, says Rana Sanaullah, deputy opposition leader who submitted the resignations to the speaker. He said that six MPAs defected from the ruling party and all of them resigned from the assembly along with other All Pakistan Democratic Movement parties’ MPAs.

If the personal appearance was the reason, Mr Gujjar appeared before the speaker to tender his resignation. But the speaker also accepted the resignation of Laila Muqadas, also a defector, who did not appear before him. It shows that issue is not legal, but political. Those three, whose resignations have been accepted, are the ones who spoke to the government officials and refused to budge. The other three have not been in touch with the government officials, he claimed.

Those, whose resignations have been accepted, include: Raja Muhammad Ali (PP-2), Raja Arshad Mahmood (PP-6), Muhammad Waqas (PP-8), Chaudhry Muhammad Ayaz (PP-9), Malik Ibrar Ahmed (PP-10), Sheikh Tanveer Ahmad (PP-26), Mehr Rab Nawaz Luk (PP-29), Rana Sanaullah Khan (PP-70), Muhammad Nawaz (PP-71), Sheikh Ijaz Ahmad (PP-72), Chaudhry Azhar Nadeem (PP-85), Arshad Mehmood Baggu (PP-122), Imran Ashraf (PP-123), Dr Asad Ashraf (PP-138), Bilal Yasin (PP-139), Muhammad Ajasam Sharif (PP-140), Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman (PP-141), Chaudhry Muhammad Shaukat (PP-143), Rana Mashhood Ahmad Khan (PP-149), Mehr Ishtiaq Ahmad (PP-150), Chaudhry Abdul Ghafoor Khan (PP-152), Syed Ihsanullah Waqas (PP-154), Muhammad Afzal (PP-160), Chaudhry Afzal Dogar (PP-166), Chaudhry Sajjad Haider Gujjar (PP-169), Mian Yawar Zaman (PP-191), Babu Nafees Ahmed Ansari (PP-195), Dr Nazir Ahmed Mithu Dogar (PP-233), Chaudhry Asghar Ali Gujjar (PP-264), Mehr Ejaz Ahmad Achlana (PP-265), Dr Syed Waseem Akhtar (PP-271), Malik Muhammad Iqbal Channer (PP-272) and Chaudhry Muhammad Shafique Anwar (PP-296), Shaheen Atiqur Rehman (W-302), Laila Muqaddus (W-329), Parveen Masood Bhatti (W-354), Afshan Farooq (W-355), Khalida Mansoor (W-356), Nighat Parveen Mir (W-357), Shahnaz Saleem (W-358), Abida Javid (W-359), Tahira Munir (W-361) and Zaibun Nisa Qureshi (W-362) and minority member Kamran Michael (NM-371).