LAHORE, Oct 2: The Punjab government has reportedly dropped the plan to convene a provincial assembly session it needed to have important bills passed to avoid opposition onslaught against it on two issues --- the Lahore Metro Bus Project and the delayed local government elections.

The government earlier intended to convene the session in the first week of October to have passed several pending bills. But officials said on Tuesday that the session was not being convened at least in the near future.

“There is no session,” said a source when inquired about it.

According to him, it was the opposition which wanted a session to corner the government on the issue of the Metro Bus Project in Lahore and the delay in local elections which the PPP wanted in Punjab (and not in Sindh) before the general elections.

The government surely needed a session to have passed at least 15 pending bills in the assembly, the sources said, adding that it would now be convened at an appropriate time. Right now there was no such plan, the source said.

The most important pending bill is about an amendment in the Local Government Ordinance 2001 that will delay announcing the local polls for another six months. The last such extension had expired in August last and the new amendment would allow the provincial government to continue running the independent district governments directly through the district coordination officers (administrators).