ISLAMABAD, January 23, 2019: The Provincial Assembly of Punjab discussed the issues concerning Indian atrocities in Kashmir, inflation and security situation in the country, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during first sitting of the 18^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for three hours and five minutes, however, the proceedings remained suspended for 40 minutes due to prayer break.
• The sitting started at 1645 hours against the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the sitting for two hours 11 minutes, while the Deputy Speaker chaired the proceedings for 13 minutes.
• The Leader of the House did not attend the sitting.
• The Leader of the Opposition attended the sitting for 54 minutes.
• As many as 58 (16%) MPAs were present at the outset and 32 (9%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leader of PPPP attended the proceedings.
• As many as five out of eight minority lawmakers attended the sitting.

Output

• The House unanimously passed a condolence resolution to pay homage to a deceased former legislator.
• The Minister for Law presented the report of the Public Accounts Committee-II on the accounts of various government departments for the audit year 2014-15.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up only four out of 24 starred questions while the lawmakers asked 10 supplementary questions as well.
• The Minister for Law responded to a Call Attention Notice highlighting an incident of robbery in Lahore while another CAN remained unaddressed due to absence of the mover.
• The Chair deferred an Adjournment Motion (AM) of PML-N lawmaker regarding provision of clean drinking water in schools as it did not receive reply from the concerned department.
• The House held a general discussion on the subjects related to Indian atrocities in Occupied Kashmir, inflation in the country, and law and order situation. As many as seven lawmakers – PTI 4, PML-N 2 and PPPP 1 – participated in the discussion consuming 64 minutes.

Order and Institutionalization

• As many as four lawmakers spoke on seven Points of Order consuming 11 minutes of the proceedings.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on January 24, 2020 (Friday) at 0900 hours.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available on Assembly’s website.
• Information on Members’ attendance is available on the Assembly’s website.

The daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Punjab Assembly proceedings conducted by PATTAN Development Organization – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are regretted