A view of the National Assembly. — File Photo

ISLAMABAD, Feb 7: The Pakistan People’s Party wants the creation of a new Seraiki province from the Punjab province, but the National Assembly witnessed on Tuesday a sharp dissent within the ruling party over an ally’s private bill seeking an easier process to divide Pakistan’s most populous province into three units of almost the same name.

The reaction to the move by Riaz Fatyana, a senior lawmaker of the government-allied Pakistan Muslim League-Q, to reshape the province of more than 60 per cent of the country’s population in three units — to be known as Punjab, Central Punjab and Southern Punjab — was so furious that the formal introduction of the draft was deferred after it was tabled to allow consultations within the ruling coalition over what PPP chief whip Khursheed Ahmed Shah called a “sensitive issue”.

A similar private bill of a PPP member, Khurram Jahangir Wattoo, met a similar fate even before its author had sought permission of the house for its introduction.

Demands for new provinces, such as one for Seraiki-speaking southern Punjab and making Hazara division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, gained momentum last month during a National Assembly debate on an abortive resolution of the government-allied Muttahida Qaumi Movement that ended with the government agreeing to moving two different bills for amendments to the Constitution.

The MQM moved a bill in a subsequent session of the lower house last month seeking the creation of a new province in southern Punjab and making Hazara division a new province, but the government has yet to come with its own promised bill for only a Seraiki province in southern Punjab.

Mr Fatyana’s Constitution (Twenty-first Amendment) Bill seemed radically different from his own party stated demand for the creation of only one additional province in the south of Punjab and of Hazara province, came while the ruling coalition and the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-N were trying to break a deadlock in their talks over the government’s Constitution (Twentieth Amendment) Bill that seeks to validate challenged post-18th Amendment by-elections to 28 seats of parliament and provincial assemblies whose present occupiers were suspended by the Supreme Court on Monday for a perceived illegality of polling held when the Election Commission was not complete.

Explaining his five-clause draft to the house, Mr Fatyana said the procedure in the Article 239 requiring an amendment to the Constitution altering the limits of a province to be approved also by at least two-thirds majority of the assembly of that province was too cumbersome and could be overcome by his formula mainly by amending the Constitution’s Article 51 to insert the names Central Punjab and Southern Punjab in addition to the Punjab and reallocating seats to three units with some consequential amendments about the strength of three Punjabi provincial assemblies and election of Senate members by the provincial assemblies.

The strongest opposition to the move came from some PPP veterans, with former minister of state for law Mohammad Afzal Sandhu, from Punjab, rejecting the idea of making the creation of new provinces as easy as in neighbouring India, former deputy speaker Zafar Ali Shah from Sindh saying “we will oppose” the move even if it meant defying a party directive, and another respected figure from the same province, Nawab Mohammad Yusuf Talpur, warning that such “interference” in provinces would “force us to consider whether we should remain in this federation or not”.

But Mr Fatyana’s bill was supported by PPP’s former minister of state Ghulam Farid Kathia, from Punjab, who said the Constitution nowhere barred the creation of new provinces, and PML-Q’s Ms Kashmala Tariq, also from Punjab, who wanted the proposed amendments examined by a house committee rather than being rejected outright.

A statement of objects accompanying Mr Fatyana’s bill says the existing procedure requiring a two-thirds majority in a provincial assembly for the adoption of a constitution amendment already passed by both houses of parliament with two-thirds majorities was “nothing except an impossible exercise because a majority will never allow creation of a new province” in an area inhabited by a small part of that province “or minority in the population of that province”.

However, amid tensions over the creation of new provinces and unresolved differences over the 20th Amendment, the house unanimously passed a private Medical and Dental Council (Amendment) Bill, authored by PML-Q member Dr Donya Aziz, which seeks to update the Medical and Dental Council Ordinance, 1962, with the stated aim to “enable the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council to ensure the quality of medical education in the country” and allowed the introduction of four new private bills by members of both the PML-N and PPP, before the house was adjourned until 5pm on Wednesday.

The first private members’ day of the present session, which began on Wednesday, was also marked by complaints from both sides of the house about law and order problem such as violence in Balochistan and the controversial role of intelligence agencies and Frontier Corps paramilitary force there, kidnappings for ransom, including those of members of non-Muslim minorities, and sectarian killings, while one PPP back-bencher, Mohammad Ejaz Virk, created a stir in the house saying he knew of two unspecified lawmakers coming to the house with weapons.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik promised a probe into Mr Virk’s allegation and call for a report and action with regard to the murder of a university professor in Sindh.

A PPP member from Balochistan, Humayun Aziz Kurd, said the FC’s role in his province was worse than those of US and Nato forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and said if the situation was not rectified, “it will be too late and perhaps we may not be here”.

PML-N member  Abdul Qadir Baloch, complained of what he called more than 300 extra-judicial killings in Balochistan and demanded a special debate on the situation in his province for a day or two.

PPP’s Farah Naz Ispahani, wife of former ambassador to the United States Hussain Haqqani, made a passionate appeal to both federal and provincial authorities to check perceived extremist groups from carrying out what she called “annihilation of Shias in Pakistan”.

Another PPP member, Fauzia Wahab, called for special training to media about financial matters in order to check misleading reporting about alleged corruption. Dr Azra Fazal Pehcuho called for the constitution of a drug regulatory authority with permission from all the provinces.