LAHORE, June 15: Opposition members held on Friday the Pakistan Muslim League-N-led Punjab government responsible for the energy crisis, stating the Punjab was the only province that had failed to follow the energy conservation plan recommended by the energy conference held in Lahore this year.

During the budget debate in the Punjab Assembly session, the opposition also criticised Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif for using derogatory language against President Asif Ali Zardari all the time.

“Why doesn’t the Punjab government make any power generation project and why doesn’t it follow the recommendations of the energy conference?” opposition’s Mian Rafique said while giving his input on the budget.

He said the chief minister should avoid point-scoring on the energy crisis and urged him to take some measures to overcome the issue. He said whenever President Zardari visited Lahore the chief minister never received him. He said the government had once again ignored south Punjab and primary and middle schools.

Zobia Abbas Malik dubbed the budget “Raiwind budget”.

She said Punjab was fully dependent on the NFC award as it had failed to increase its own resources.

“Punjab’s 83 per cent of funds come from the NFC while Sindh’s are 55 per cent and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s and Balochistan’s 60 per cent each,” she said.

She urged the Punjab government to increase its financial resources instead of consuming the NFC award.

She said the government would have generated 1,200 megawatt, had it utilized around 7,000 tones garbage being collected by the Lahore Waste Management Company in Lahore every day. She also demanded allocations for hiring of teachers.

Tahir Iqbal advised the chief minister tell the people about closure of 550 mosque schools and missing facilities in 20,000 schools of the province, all at the cost of Daanish schools. He said the chief minister should have launched energy projects in Punjab instead of establishing his camp office at Minar-i-Pakistan.

Fauzia Behram also called the budget as Raiwind budget and alleged that the Punjab government was involved in massive corruption in laptop, sasti roti and several other projects.

Sajida Meer said as the federal government had reduced POL prices, the Punjab government should pay attention to edibles’ prices.

Sagheera Islam declared the Punjab budget as Shahbaz budget while Rifat Sultana Dar called Mr Sharif as Zalim-i-Ala.

PML-N members defended the budget calling it a balanced and poor-friendly move.

Tanveer Nasir called the State Guesthouse a den of corruption, alleging that Federal Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi was awarding fertilizer permits to his cronies. The session was adjourned for broken quorum till Monday.

LAW MINISTER: Law Minister Rana Sanaullah while talking to the media outside the Punjab Assembly said the nation had full confidence in the judiciary and the media rather than in politicians and lawyers. He urged media organisations to take action against corrupt media owners.

He said the corrupt people had now become the owner of media groups and the people received a great shock after seeing the real faces of some TV anchors.