KARACHI, Aug 12: MQM chief Altaf Hussain has urged the government to waive the principal amount and interest on longstanding loans granted to poor and small landholders and agriculturists of Sindh.

In a statement, Mr Hussain said that while the successive governments bailed out big industrialists and feudal lords, it was unfortunate that poor landowners were ignored.

Addressing members of the party's research and advisory council, Mr Hussain also demanded that smaller provinces be given their due rights to save the country. He said that in the age of information technology people cannot be kept in bondage by using brute force. He asked the rulers to accept this reality.

Mr Hussain pointed out that people and leaders of smaller provinces had been complaining for many years that Punjab was trying to usurp their rights and resources on the basis of its population weightage.

But he regretted that instead of listening to the grievances of smaller provinces, their voice was being suppressed through the use of force. In this context, he pointed out that force was being used in Balochistan to suppress the voice of the people.

Mr Hussain cautioned that the matter cannot be solved by calling them traitors or using force against the people and subjecting them to bombardment. There was no military solution to the problem, he emphasized.

Mr Hussain also emphasized the need for invoking ijtehad to adapt to the changing socio-politico-economic and cultural environment at a given point in time.

He regretted that Muslims stopped ijtehad centuries ago and, therefore, they were lagging behind and were in such a pathetic condition. He said that it was owing to the fact that Muslims were not practising Islam in its true spirit.