Ten-minute session!
Karachi:The session of the City-District Council on Monday could not last over 10 minutes owing to the scanty presence of the council members for various reasons and was adjourned to August 30.
The City Naib-Nazim Nasreen Jalil, convenor, while adjourning the session did not specifically point to the lack of quorum on the part of the council members but certain quarters privy to the session firmly said that if pointed out by any of the members the city council session would be found to be glaringly lacking the number of members required to convene and run a session. Less than 100 members were present in the House when the convener adjourned the session to August 30 whereas the requirement of quorum was at least 51 per cent presence of the members out of 255-member house, said a source in the House.
Before the adjournment of the session, the House offered Fateha for the departed souls of noted fiction writer of the Sub-Continent Qurratulain Hyder, poet Khalid Alig, and slain student of JPMC’s School of Physiotherapy Farhan Ahmed Butt.
Earlier, at the outset of the session, Abdur Razzaq, a member of the House from the Al-Khidmat opposition panel, raised a point of order to talk on the incident of violence and firing at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) on August 25, which claimed the life of a first-year physiotherapy student Farhan Butt belonging to the Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba. On the point of order he said last Saturday’s incident of violence against JPMC students had been the second within the last 10 days and proved well the gross inefficiency, ineptitude, and dereliction from duty on the part of law-enforcement agencies deployed at the healthcare institution and allied educational institutes.
Replying to the opposition member’s assertions, the City Naib-Nazim said that the highly placed authorities of the government had already sensed the gravity of situation prevailing at the JPMC and had already convened meetings of the government and security officials concerned to review the law and order situation at Jinnah Hospital and allied institutions of medical education.
On another point of order, Asif Siddiqui, a leader of the Treasury Haq Parast group, said the Treasury benches had submitted a fresh resolution on the issue of traffic jams containing recommendations and proposals for resolving the lingering civic issue causing immense problems for the city commuters. He also reportedly said that the Treasury benches had also withdrawn their objections to the earlier opposition-moved resolution on the issue of traffic jams.
Nasreen Jalil while adjourning the session till August 30 observed that several members had not come to attend the session as they were busy in the cleanliness and sanitation activities in connection with the recent rainy spell in the metropolis and observance of the approaching Shab-e-Baraat.
Source: The News
Date:8/28/2007
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