PIC attack issue: PA Speaker orders in-camera briefing

LAHORE :Punjab Assembly Speaker Ch Pervaiz Elahi has ordered treasury to give in-camera briefing to the house committee on the issue of lawyers’ ‘attack’ on Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) because the matter is sub judice.

“The government must hold an immediate in-camera briefing on the issue of PIC attack before house committee-six to take the house in confidence on progress in the case as the matter was pending in Lahore High Court,” Ch Pervaiz Elahi ordered Law Minister Raja Basharat during the Punjab Assembly session here on Thursday.

PML-N MPA Safdar Shakir had pointed out that the lawyers planned the attack during an assembly at Aiwan-e-Adl and then marched all the way up to seven kilometres to carry out the planned attack on PIC, which also resulted in loss of precious lives of cardiac patients in the hospital. “While all this was happening, the police chose to play the role of a silent spectator,” he alleged.

Responding to an adjournment motion by PML-N MPA Safdar Shakir pointing out police’s inefficiency in preventing the attack, Raja Basharat said that a special committee constituted by Punjab government had completed its investigations and presented its recommendations with regard to police’s inefficiency and other administrative mishaps, which contributed to failure in preventing the attack on PIC earlier this month.

“Punjab government has not made it public, considering the matter being sub judice in the Lahore High Court,” he added.

Raja Basharat informed that Lahore High Court had also formed an eight-member committee comprising four members each from doctors’ community and lawyers’ fraternity. “The committee has held its first meeting a couple of days ago, while the next meeting will be held on Friday (today),” he said while making an appeal not to make the issue a clash between two most respectable communities of doctors and lawyers.

He said the Punjab government would take action on the basis of LHC’s directions besides taking into account the recommendations of respective committees constituted by the Punjab government and Lahore High Court in this regard.

Earlier responding to call attention notices raised by Rabia Naseem Farooqi and Hina Pervaiz Butt, the law minister also assured that the law will take its course in the matter of an accidental killing of a man in Sunder police area and dacoity-cum-murder in Nawab Town police precincts.

Earlier, Punjab Minister Livestock & Dairy Development Sardar Husnain Bahadar Dreshak failed to answer Rabia Naseem Farooqi’s question on demand and supply of milk in Lahore daily in order to ascertain the amount of adulteration in the milk. “There is no such data on the demand and supply of milk in Lahore,” he said when Rabia Naseem Farooqi pointed out that, according to an estimate, the production/supply of milk in Lahore was merely 20 per cent of the total consumption in the city. She also demanded for examining the amount of adulteration in milk on a daily basis.

Speaker Ch Pervaiz Elahi, however, intervened and said that it was local government’s domain to engage Punjab Food Authority to check the amount of adulteration in the milk. Besides, he said, there are labs including PCSIR, which may be involved to check the milk adulteration.

To another query raised on behalf of Azma Zahid Bukhari regarding presence of Gawala Colony in Harbanspura within Lahore’s jurisdiction in violation of the law to move the buffalo and cows outside the city, Punjab Minister Livestock & Dairy Development Sardar Husnain Bahadar Dreshak confirmed the presence of Gawala Colony in Harbanspura falling within the limits of Lahore, but once again failed to answer the amount of production of milk there. Speaker Pervaiz Elahi again came to his rescue, saying that it was local government’s jurisdiction.

Besides, Punjab Minister Livestock & Dairy Development Sardar Husnain Bahadar Dreshak also gave details of the budget and various livestock and dairy development activities being undertaken by the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (UVAS), Lahore and Veterinary Research Institute, Lahore Cant.