Rape of minor girls in Kasur, Mardan, Nowshera

KP Assembly condemns incidents

By Nisar Mahmood

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly was adjourned amid pandemonium on Friday as the opposition raised the issue of Billion Tree Tsunami project in the House.

The lawmakers were debating the Billion Tree Tsunami project over a question by Sobia Shahid of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) when Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)'s Zarin Zia from the treasury pointed out the lack of quorum. It caused pandemonium and exchange of shouting and chants.

Opposition members including Sobia Shahid, Mufti Syed Janan of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) and Syed Jaffar Shah of the Awami National Party (ANP) challenged the figure provided by the concerned Forest department and Minister for Higher Education Mushtaq Ghani's claim of planting 1.20 billion saplings at a cost of Rs14 billion. Mufti Syed Janan said the Forest department is claiming to have planted 27,74,241 saplings in Hangu, but he disputed the figure and challenged it to prove if it has been able to plant just 0.2 million saplings.

Jaffar Shah also challenged the claim and said the government had shown planting of 58,64,775 plants in Kalam in Swat district, but in reality 85 plants only had not been planted as people of the area had boycotted the scheme and the concerned forest officer told a lie about the plantation.

Sobia Shahid said it was astonishing that the department had provided a figure of 220 million saplings' plantation in five divisions of the province, ie Mardan, Malakand, Hazara, Kohat and Dera Ismail Khan and this meant that the remaining about one billion saplings were planted in just two divisions, Peshawar and Bannu. She demanded an inquiry into the alleged embezzlement in the project.

However, Mushtaq Ghani and his PTI colleague Dr Haider Ali said the project was acclaimed internationally and organisations like World Wildlife Fund (WWF) termed it a success. They asked the speaker to defer the question as the concerned minister was not present in the House. As the treasury benches wanted to come out of a difficult situation due to the opposition's insistence on debating the issue, Zarin Zia pointed out the lack of quorum and the speaker adjourned the session till Monday amid an uproar.

Earlier, the issue of rape and murder of a minor girl from Mardan, Asma, sparked heated debate in the House. Just after recitation from the Holy Quran, Nighat Orakzai of Pakistan People's Party (PPP) raised the issue on a point of order and said the police tried to hide the incident and the facts.

She pointed out that the government is claiming to have arrested 58 accused in the Mashal Khan murder case, but the main culprit was still at large. She also raised the question of non-arrest of the main accused in the Dera Ismail Khan incident in which a girl was paraded naked. "This showed the inefficiency of the so-called model police," she remarked.

Ubaid Mayar of the PTI said the Mardan incident was condemnable, but there should be joint efforts to make necessary laws and take steps for preventing incidents like Mardan, Kasur, Dera Ismail Khan, Nowshera and Haripur in future.

Parliamentary leader of PML-N Sardar Aurangzeb Nalotha said the Mardan, Nowshera and Kasur incidents shocked the whole country, but the Dera Ismail Khan incident had no match in the world history. He questioned why the law-enforcing agencies failed to nab the culprits. He said that instead of blame game against each other, the concerned departments and authorities should be held responsible. "The inspector general of police should resign over the failure of his force to arrest the culprits," he argued.

Shaukat Yousufzai of PTI, Jamaat-e-Islami's Aizazul Mulk Afkari and Qaumi Watan Party (QWP)'s Meraj Humayun Khan also condemned the incident and called for collective efforts to avoid such heinous crimes and enact necessary laws.

Nadia Sher, parliamentary secretary on Home, presented police report about the Mardan incident and said that 116 people had been interrogated while the post-mortem report was sent for DNA to Lahore. However, Meraj Humayun said there was nothing new in the report and the culprits had yet to be arrested. She said the government had closed child protection centres that were meant for protection of children.

The House unanimously passed a condemnation resolution moved by Nighat Orakzai regarding the Mardan incident and demanded early arrest and punishment of the accused and submission of complete report by the police.

Through another resolution moved by Fakhre Azam Wazir of PPP and signed by members of different parties, a judicial inquiry into the murder of Naqeebullah Mahsud in Karachi was demanded.

The resolution said departmental inquiry was not acceptable and the matter should be probed by a judicial commission. The House also adopted a resolution moved by Amna Sardar of PML-N condemning the Mardan, Kasur and Nowshera incidents and demanding exemplary punishment to the culprits. Two other resolutions were related to maternal mortality and 10 to 15 percent increase in job quota for women in agriculture department.

Minister for Information Shah Farman objected to passage of the resolutions in a hurry and said these should be discussed. He said child abuse was a serious issue and its root-causes be identified so that practical steps are taken for curbing such incidents in future. He said the House should debate it for a day or two instead of passing just resolutions.

Earlier, Mufti Janan staged a protest sit-in on the floor against non-release of oil and gas royalty to his constituency in Hangu. He ended his protest on assurance by Zar Gul Khan of PTI that he would take up the matter with the chief minister within a couple of days. Mufti Janan said that if the government failed to make sure the release of Rs100.83 million as royalty to Hangu, he would go for any option of protest including protest sit-in in front of the Assembly.