ISLAMABAD: The two houses of parliament — National Assembly and Senate — which met jointly for two days to ­discuss the security situation in the wake of increasing tension between India and Pakistan will resume their regular ­sessions on Monday (today).

The orders of the day issued separately for the two houses meeting after a two-day recess reveal that when the National Assembly will be going back to its routine business, members of the Senate, besides taking up some private member’s bills and resolutions, will still be discussing “the ongoing tension between Pakistan and India”.

The National Assembly is yet to pass the Finance Supplementary (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019, commonly known as mini-budget, which was presented by Finance Minister Asad Umar on Jan 23.

During its previous sitting, the National Assembly has taken up the Senate recommendations on the finance bill for discussion, but it could not hold the debate — first due to the tense atmosphere in the house because of the government-opposition tussle over recent actions of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and then owing to the increase in tension between India and Pakistan in the aftermath of the Pulwama incident.

Discussion on Pakistan-India tension still on agenda of upper house

The agenda of the National Assembly for the Monday’s session includes introduction of the Heavy Industries Taxila Board (Amendment) Bill, 2019 by Minister for Defence Production Zubaida Jalal and passage of the Elections (Amendment) Bill, 2018 and the Finance Supplementary (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019.

Besides this, legislators are also set to hold a debate on “the energy situation in the country and possible way forward”. The house is also set to hold a debate on the address of President Dr Arif Alvi to the joint sitting of parliament on Sept 17 last year.

The Senate Secretariat has issued a 33-point agenda for the Monday’s private member’s day sitting which includes introduction of five bills and discussion on as many bills.

The bills to be introduced in the Senate are the Islamabad Compulsory Vaccination and Protection of Health Workers Bill, 2019 to give power to make the vaccination for universal immunisation of children compulsory and to protect the health workers designated for immunisation programmes; the Islamabad Community Integration Bill, 2019 to provide for the welfare and integration of communities; the Maintenance and Welfare of Old Parents and Senior Citizens Bill, 2019 to provide for the maintenance and welfare of old parents and well-being, comfort and dignity of the senior citizens; the Post Office Bill, 2019 to repeal and enact the laws relating to the postal services; and the Pakistan Courier and Logistics Regulatory Authority Bill,2018 to provide for establishment of Pakistan Courier and Logistic Authority.

Besides discussing the ongoing tension between Pakistan and India, the upper house of parliament is also set to hold a discussion on the issues of possible rise in inflation, the overall performance of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), the situation arising out of rapid population increase in the country and the ­measures to control the same, and the performance of commercial counsellors, commercial secretaries and trade ­ministers presently posted in Pakistan’s missions abroad and the need to improve their performance.

There are four resolutions in the agenda of the Senate.

Through a resolution to be moved by Bahramand Khan Tangi, the house has been asked to recommend to the government to shift the headquarters of Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited from Lahore to Islamabad.

Through another resolution, 10 ­members of the Pakistan Peoples Party want the house to recommend “that the government should retain the headquarters of PIA in Karachi rather than relocating it to Islamabad”.

Published in Dawn, March 4th, 2019