ISLAMABAD, May 31: The Senate secretariat has disallowed debate on resolutions and motions filed by opposition senators about armed forces’ commercial activities. The opposition senators had filed the motions seeking debate on involvement of armed forces in multi-billion business and commercial activities on “technical grounds,” sources told Dawn.

Correspondence between Senate secretariat and Senator Farhatullah Babar of the Peoples Party Parliamentarians shows that the latter had submitted a resolution and a motion on February 16 on the involvement of armed forces in commercial activities.

The resolution said, “this House is of the view that armed forces should not be involved in commercial and industrial activities”.

An identical motion filed by the PPP senator said: “This House may discuss the impact of industrial, commercial and real estate activities of the armed forces.”

However, the Senate secretariat declared the resolution and the motion inadmissible under Rule 121(3) of the Rules of Business on the ground that the subject matter was too general. The secretariat on March 9 in a letter had asked the mover to “make it specific for its admissibility.”

In response to the objections raised by the Senate secretariat, Senator Babar replied that when the armed forces were increasingly engaged in industrial and commercial activities it adversely impacted on their professional preparedness.

He also attached a list of the commercial and industrial enterprises of the armed forces which was provided to the Senate by the defence ministry itself in reply to question on April 26.

To make the motion specific, Senator Babar reworded it as, “This House may discuss the impact on professional preparedness of the armed forces on increasingly burdening them with running industrial, commercial and real estate enterprises.”

However, again rejecting the amended resolution, the Senate secretariat declared the reworded motion and resolution as “vague” and asked the mover through a letter dated May 24 to indicate what was meant by “burdened” to make it clear and precise.

The mover in his reply said that the dictionary meaning of the word ‘burden’ is load. Its synonyms are weight, lumber, weigh down, saddle, yoke, encumber and trouble.

Senator Babar said Article 245(1) of the Constitution reads the Armed Forces shall, under the directions of the federal government defend Pakistan against external aggression or threat of war.

“To carry out this constitutional function the armed forces are given specialised training at public expense.

They are trained to defend the country, not to run industries and commercial enterprises”, said Senator Babar.

He said when the armed forces were also called upon to perform other roles such as setting up and running commercial and real estate enterprises, not commensurate with their professional training, it saddles them with extra functions exposing them to be weighed down and encumbered that can also be troubling.