KP Assembly passes law

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Monday unanimously passed the Journalists Welfare Endowment Fund (Amendment) Act, 2015, amending Section 8 of Act No XII of the 2014.
Information Minister Mushtaq Ghani moved the bill that increased the amount of medical treatment for deserving journalists. As per the new amendment, a sum not exceeding Rs100,000 in case of medical treatment of the deserving journalist shall be paid to the journalist.
The claim must be supported by vouchers or invoices verified by a registered medical practitioner or government health authority. Previously the amount was Rs20,000.
Earlier, the House held a heated debate on a question by Mufti Fazal Ghafoor of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUF-F) about the tourism development in Buner district and on a call attention by Maulana Asmatullah of JUI-F.
Mufti Fazal Ghafoor said the concerned department put a wrong answer to his question.
However, Minister for Sports and Tourism Amjad Afridi said that a feasibility study about tourism development schemes in different parts of the province including Supat valley in Kohistan, Kumrat in Upper Dir and in Kaghan and Buner was under process. He asked the mover to discuss the matter with him.
Maulana Asmatullah in his call attention raised the issue of the establishment of a police station in Kohistan.
He said the construction of eight police stations in Shangla, Swat and Kohistan districts was sanctioned in the Annual Development Programme (ADP) and one police station was approved at Koz Paro, Kohistan but the district police officer of Kohistan was adamant to change the site.
He asked for referring the notice to the relevant committee, but Minister for Public Health Engineering Shah Farman opposed the demand and said the police station would be built at the selected place.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)’s Shaukat Yousafzai, who presided over the session, put the matter before the House for vote when the opposition pushed for it to be referred to the select committee of the assembly.
The majority of the members voted against referring the call attention notice to the committee.
PTI’s Mehmood Jan raised the issue of private Haj operators for overcharging the Hajj pilgrims. He said this year the government made arrangements for 65,000 Hajj pilgrims while more than 70,000 were sent by private Hajj operators, who charged Rs0.4 million per pilgrim against the government rate of Rs0.2 million.
Demanding ban on the private Hajj operators, he said the government facilities were better than the private Hajj operators.
Minister for Auqaf and Religious Affairs Habibur Rahman said the matter was related to the federal government. He said the government didn’t have the capacity to send such a large number of pilgrims and that was the reason the private sector was involved in the business.
However, he said there should be a system of checks and balances to regulate the affairs of the private Hajj operators. The Speaker adjourned the session till November 16.