Cabinet okays amendment to code of criminal procedure

LAHORE:The Punjab Cabinet, which held its 21st meeting at CM Office under the chair of Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar here Tuesday, approved amendment to code of criminal procedure.

After the amendment, the first-class magistrates could be given the powers of price control. Besides, sources said that some of the ministers expressed unhappiness over the way politicians have been blamed by previous bureaucratic hierarchy of Punjab for using their influence and urged the new bureaucratic team to address the just grievances of people instead of shifting the blame of failure towards politicians.

Responding to their complaints, the CM assured his cabinet members that the genuine problems of the elected representatives would be solved on priority basis. The cabinet approved the establishment of Punjab local government finance commission and endorsed the decision of setting up sessions courts in Kot Radha Kishan (Kasur) and Kot Momin (Sargodha).

The meeting also approved amendment to police rules, 1934 for the tribal areas of Rajanpur and DG Khan. On this occasion, recommendations with regard to priority utilisation of natural gas under Articles 158 and 172 (3) of the Constitution were approved, as well. Recommendations for the exploration of mineral resources of different blocks of Khuzdar South, Surrah and Musa Khel were endorsed on the request of the Balochistan government.

The meeting decided to forward recommendations to the federal government with regard to amendments to oil and gas regulatory authority ordinance, 2002. The meeting decided to forward the matter of technical assistance of the Asian Development Bank for the training of skilled workforce to the cabinet committee for finance and development. The cabinet committee will submit its recommendations after complete review.

The cabinet meeting reviewed the price control situation and endorsed the minutes of 20th cabinet meeting along with the endorsement of decisions made in the 17th meeting of the cabinet standing committee on finance and development.

Addressing the meeting, the CM asked the cabinet members to work as a team to deliver adding that line departments should proactively perform to make the anti-polio campaign a success. The chief minister announced that he was starting visiting different districts from the next week and added that price control measures, cleanliness, law and order and civic amenities would be inspected by him. I have empowered chief secretary and IG Police, he added. Sources revealed that Punjab Information Minister Fayyaz-ul-Hassan Chohan on the occasion stressed on the redress of the just grievances raised by the MPA. He was quoted as saying that politicians had been alleged for using their influence by the previous bureaucratic setup and stated that PTI MPAs don’t support any unlawful activity.

A minister also stated that it wasn’t fair on the part of bureaucracy to blame politicians for their own failure. Another minister suggested that some time of the cabinet should also be given to those public issues which were not made part of the agenda.

This is noteworthy that during the meeting, presentation of two departments related to education and forest couldn’t be done as the secretaries concerned were not present.