ISLAMABAD: The PPP challenged on Thursday the data presented by the government before the Senate about the amount of gas produced in the country and the number of connections in each province.

PPP’s Sassui Palejo drew the attention of the house towards a written reply by Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Shahid Khaqan Abbasi in response to her question, showing Sindh as the largest consumer of gas despite having 1.8 million less domestic and commercial consumers than Punjab.

The minister, however, said the difference was because of the fact that Sindh had more industrial units. Moreover, he said, the industrial units in Punjab remained closed for four months whereas in Sindh they continued to receive gas throughout the year. He said that because of acute shortage of gas, now Sindh’s industrial units would also be kept closed for one day in a week.

Nauman Wazir of the PTI alleged that the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were also not getting their due share even though the province produced more gas than Punjab.

Because of gas shortage, industrial units in Sindh will now be closed for one day each week, says minister

Adjournment motion

Meanwhile, Chairman Raza Rabbani admitted an adjournment motion moved by PML-Q’s Mushahid Hussain seeking a discussion on the State of the Union speech by US President Barack Obama in which he mentioned Pakistan in the context of terrorism and extremism and said instability would continue for decades in the country.

The chair fixed Monday for the debate on the issue and directed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to respond to the points raised by members.

Moving the motion, the PML-Q leader said the US President’s remarks were contrary to the claims being made by the Pakistan government regarding success of the ongoing Zarb-i-Azb operation.

The house consumed most of its time discussing the draft of amendment to the rules for the constitution of Senate Committee on Ethics and draft of the Code of Conduct for the senators prepared by a special committee of the house.

Despite its opposition by the JUI-F, the house approved the draft which would now formally be introduced for approval paving the way for the first-ever ethics committee for the senators.

Gas connections

The written reply submitted by the petroleum minister shows that out of 4,163 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) gas produced in the country, 2,781mmcfd is produced in Sindh, 875 mmcfd in Balochistan, 362mmcfd in KP and 145 mmcfd in Punjab.

According to the minister, Sindh consumes 1,870mmcfd of gas, Punjab 1,122 mmcfd, Balochistan 405mmcfd and KP293mmcfd.

It shows that 3,120 industrial units in Punjab are getting 238mmcfd of gas whereas 4,100 industrial units in Sindh are being supplied 696mmcfd. On the other hand, 60 industrial units in Balochistan are receiving only eight mmcfd and 234 industrial units in KP are getting 36mmcfd.

According to the minister’s reply, there are 4,296,966 domestic connections in Punjab, 2,461,937 in Sindh, 624,871 in KP and 251,194 in Balochistan. There are 43,825 commercial gas connections in Punjab, 20,635 in Sindh, 8,006 in KP and 2,554 in Balochistan. There are 1,670 CNG stations in Punjab, 616 in Sindh, 546 in KP and only 24 in Balochistan.

NAB cases

In response to a question by PML-N Nisar Mohammad Khan, Law Minister Pervaiz Rashid informed the house that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had made recoveries worth Rs5.72 billion during the past three years, out of which Rs718.65m had been given to the bureau under “budgetary support measures”.

He said the amount recovered from the accused was deposited in the federal consolidated funds from where it was returned to federal and provincial departments concerned.

However, he said, out of the recovered amount, the Finance Division credited a small percentage to NAB as “budgetary support measures” under the rules notified in September 2002.

The minister said 1,228 corruption cases had been registered in NAB during the past three years, out which the bureau had authorised investigations in 453 cases.

The province-wise break-up as provided by the law minister in writing shows that

According to the minister, 638 cases were registered in Punjab, including Islamabad, 261 in Sindh, 188 in KP and 141 in Balochistan.

The NAB recovered Rs3.817bn from Punjab, Rs1.141bn from Sindh, Rs648.237m from KP and Rs113.685m from Balochistan.

Published in Dawn, January 15th, 2016