ISLAMABAD, March 7, 2019: The Senate adopted a resolution against Indian government’s decision to ban Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK), observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet on Thursday.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during seventh sitting of 287^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for three hours and 18 minutes.
• The sitting started at the scheduled time of 1500 hours.
• The Chairman presided over the entire sitting.
• The Deputy Chairman was not present.
• The Leader of House attended the sitting for two hours and 32 minutes.
• The Leader of the Opposition was present for an hour and 55 minutes.
• The Prime Minister did not attend the sitting.
• As many as 15 lawmakers (14%) were present at the outset and 19 (18%) at the adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PPPP, PML-N, PML-F, PTI, BNP-M and PkMAP attended the sitting.
• As many as two out of four minority lawmakers were present.

Output

• Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs laid the Medical and Dental Council Ordinance, 2019 in the House.
• On behalf of Chairperson Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication, a member of the Committee presented report on the budgetary allocation and its utilization by the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication.
• The House granted sixty-day extension to the Standing Committee on Law and Justice for presentation of its reports on the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues (Amendment) Bill, 2018; the Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2018 (Amendment of Article 27) and the Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2018 (Amendment of Fourth Schedule).

 Representation and Responsiveness

• Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs responded to a Calling Attention Notice (CAN) regarding the federal government’s reported decision to get back powers from the provinces to collect GST on Services, tax the agriculture income and place a unified valuation rates for real estate.
• Another CAN about imposing ban on union activities through imposition of Essential Services Act, 1952 was referred to the relevant committee.
• The Chair deferred debate about excessive use and sale of antibiotics at medical stores on the request of the Leader of the House.
• The House took up 11 out of 30 Starred Questions of which one was referred to the relevant committee. Four questions were deferred on the government’s request, six lapsed due to the absence of the movers while nine questions were not considered. The lawmakers also asked 23 supplementary questions.
• As many as eight lawmakers raised Points of Public Importance for 28 minutes.

Order and Institutionalization 

• As many as seven lawmakers spoke on points of order for 47 minutes.
• The Opposition lawmakers walked out of the proceedings for ten minutes to register their concerns about health of former Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on March 8, 2019 (Friday) at 1030  hours.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
• The attendance of lawmakers is available on the website.

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Senate proceeding conducted by Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN). Errors and omissions are excepted