LAHORE, Jan 14: It was a sad day for those who expected the Punjab Assembly to discuss inflation and suggest some serious measures to control it to provide relief to the common man.

On Friday, the House was to debate price hike in the province. However, as soon as it finished debating the fake attendance issue, which was more of matter of ego for some members, the assembly, led by the Treasury, lost interest in proceedings.

Within minutes of starting the debate, the members, including ministers – Rana Sanaullah and Malik Nadeem Kamran – sneaked out of the House. Within next 10 minutes, the quorum broke down, and was pointed out by Samina Khawar Hayat of the opposition. The speaker ordered counting and found it lacking. Bells were rung for five minutes, but no one returned to House.

PML-Q’s Mohsin Leghari stood on a point of order to ask the speaker why the ministers and parliamentary secretaries had left the House. “It is sad that the treasury has not been able to spare its attention for price hike. It also reflects how seriously the Punjab government takes the issue of price hike,” he said.

The House was adjourned till Monday afternoon.

Earlier, the opposition questioned the provision of a permanent official residence to retired Lahore High Court chief justice Khwaja Sharif at the GOR-I, Lahore.

Amer Sultan Cheema through his adjournment motion said the chief minister had allotted the residence to the retired judge against the law.

The mover said that the House should be informed under what circumstances or law the permanent official residence was provided to a retired judge.

Responding to the motion, Mr Sanaullah said it was discretion of the chief minister to allot the residence, and there was thus no violation of law.

In ordinary circumstances, every government officer has to vacate official residence after six months of retirement, but the chief minister has discretionary powers to allot a public residence to any one as a special case in public interest.

He said the residence was allotted to the judge after intelligence reports that his life was in danger.