Senate body approves Right To Information bill

ISLAMABAD: The Senate Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting accorded approval to the Right to Information Bill 2017 Monday and showered praise on PPP Senator Farhatullah Babar for his key role with reference to the role of the House special committee on the matter.

The committee met here with Senator Kamil Ali Agha in the chair. Senator Babar said that the special committee had minutely studied the government and the private member’s bill on the subject and found hardly any difference between the two. He noted the bill was approved with consensus by the special committee, but now there were some dissenting voices. He was sure the concerns would be duly removed. Babar was convener of the special committee.

Kamil Agha said that no changes were brought about in the bill, barring correction with regards wordings. Right to information, he said, was the constitutional right of people and added without right to information, other freedoms were meaningless.

Senator Babar believed that the bill for protection and welfare of media persons was extremely important, as during last ten years, as many as 112 journalists had embraced martyrdom in the line of duty.

He pointed out that out of these, only culprits, involved in two cases could be held so far while the rest, relating to other 110 cases were yet to be apprehended. He noted the media had kept alive the case of murder of journalist Wali Khan Babar and that of Daniel Pearl, whose perpetrators were arrested.

Babar said the government bill did not carry mention of reforms, on this, committee chairman said that if there were reservations, the committee would bring its own bill on the matter.

The government and opposition senators expressed deep concern over the content being shown during Ramazan transmissions and feared funding was being made to defame Islam. They lamented that actors and actresses were being shown spreading the message of Islam.