KARACHI, Feb 3: The Sindh Assembly on Tuesday called upon the federal government to direct the Federal Board of Revenue to immediately stop collecting General Sales Tax on electricity, gas, telephones and other services, and refund the services tax collected thus far to the provinces.

This demand was made in a resolution adopted unanimously by the house. The resolution, a revised version of Mazahir Amir Khan’s resolution which was on the order of the day, was moved by Shoaib Bokhari with the endorsement by Mr Khan.

The proceedings on Tuesday, which was a private members’ day, were so bland that even points of order raised by members across the board failed to attract the interest of the members.

Speaker Nisar Ahmad Khuhro, who called the house to order at 11.25am after the adoption of two of the five resolutions on the agenda, called it a day at 2.20pm. The assembly will meet again on Wednesday at 10am.

Before he adjourned the session, Information Minister Shazia Marri drew his attention to another resolution that pertained to the implementation of the 7th Wage Award for journalists. The chair asked her to take it up on Wednesday out of turn and also ask the members to come to the house on time so that the business of the day could be completed by 2pm, its scheduled time.

The text of the resolution adopted on GST services is as follows:

“The assembly resolves and recommends to the government to approach the Federal Government to direct the Federal Board of Revenue to immediately discontinue collection of General Sales Tax on electricity, gas and telephones and any other service, and refund the service tax to date to provinces where the service was provided, as the levy and collections of Sales Tax on services is a provincial subject as per the constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan.”

Before the adoption of the amended resolution, Syed Shoaib Bokhari moved a notice of amendment under Rule 108(1) of the Rules of Procedure of the provincial assembly seeking amendment in Resolution 56 moved by Mazahir Amir Khan.

Earlier, when Mr Khan’s resolution was taken up, Syed Sardar Ahmad, suggesting amendment in the resolution, not only endorsed the demand for stopping collection of GST on telephones and refund of the amount so far collected, but also GST on electricity and gas also, saying that its levy and collection was the right of provincial governments under the 1973 Constitution.

He said his colleagues had also moved resolutions on the subject for the restoration of the services tax on electricity and gas to the provinces, but they could not be taken up as they did not come in the balloting. He suggested that instead of adopting the resolution on phones, it should be made comprehensive.

Relief for the people

Syed Sardar Ahmad said after the restoration of services tax rights to the provinces, the federal government should be requested to reduce the tax rate so that the people could get relief.

He gave the figures from the latest CBR report which indicated that during the last five years the CBR had collected Rs213 billion from the provinces on account of services tax.

Amir Moeen endorsed the views of Sardar Ahmad.

Syed Murad Ali Shah pointed out that the tax on services was a right of the province that was taken illegally by a military ruler in 2002.

In 2004, the Sindh assembly passed a resolution for the restoration of the right of the province but no heed was paid to it. However, he said he hoped that this right of the provinces would be restored soon “as our chief minister has already written two letters to the federal government in this regard”.

The other resolution adopted by the house was moved by Mohammad Shahryar Khan Mahar regarding ensuring the availability of seeds of rice and all kinds of grains in the province for the coming paddy season.

He said paddy was damaged by recent rains, and for 20 days with the start of procurement, rice seeds were not available.

Najmuddin Abro endorsed the views.

Law Minister Ayaz Soomro, recalling a statement of Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah on the floor of the house for providing relief to the growers, assured the house that whatever resolution would be adopted by the house, it would be implemented and paddy and other grain seeds’ availability would be ensured.

Before giving floor to the information minister, Speaker Nisar Khuhro reminded the house of the importance of Feb 3, saying it was the birthday of Asifa Zardari, daughter of the late Benazir Bhutto.

Information Minister Shazia Marri before reading out a statement under Rule 215, moved a verbal resolution extending greeting and best wishes to Asifa Zardari. The resolution was adopted unanimously.

In her statement, she pointed to the government commitment to press freedom in line with the vision of the late Benazir Bhutto.

She said for the first time, in the spirit of national reconciliation, all political forces had come together in the greater interest of the people and were sharing responsibilities of the province.

The minister also recalled efforts of Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah to fast-track redress of public grievances and to take measures to attain the objectives of good governance, accountability and transparency.

State of education and health

The day’s proceedings started with the points of order. Bilqees Mukhatr was the first to raise the issue of private educational institutions, where people were being charged high fees besides collecting contributions due to the non- existence of a controlling authority.

She also pointed to the menace of fake doctors and hospitals everywhere in the city.

Education Minister Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq said that there was a fully-fledged directorate to enforce the rules governing the private educational institutions. Besides, monitoring committees composed of MPAs were also being formed.

He asked the MPAs that if any violation of the law governing the private institutions, or complaints brought to their knowledge be referred to the complaint cell set up at the directorate so that action could be initiated against the violators.

Health Minister Saghir Ahmad endorsed the views of Bilqees Mukhtar and said recommendations had been made for setting up a private hospitals regulatory authority.

Humera Alwani said the government had reopened 2,500 of the 7,500 schools which lay closed in the province. She said in her district, Thatta, 500 schools were still not operational and called for measures to open them

She also asked the government to approach the federal government to get released the 26 fishermen who were arrested by the Indian navy on Monday.

Education Minister Pir Mazhar said that during the last nine months the government had recruited 7,000 teachers with the assistance of the World Bank and 13,000 more would be recruited soon. He said that during the period out of the 7,700 closed schools 2,500 were made functional and the remaining would also be made functional in the next six months.

He said the main reason for the closure of the schools was the shortage of teachers, as they were not recruited during the last 11 years.

He said the government was trying to reopen schools but keeping them functional was the responsibility of the local government institutions after the devolution of powers.

Najmuddin Abro raised the issue of the devastation caused by the rains last December. Terming the rains unprecedented in the province which, he said, had devastated not only the rice crop but also made farmers homeless. He asked the chief minister to announce a package for the farmers to provide shelter to them.

Shama Mithani drew the attention of the house to the need to create awareness about the lawyers appointed by the government to take up cases of women facing hardships or suffering imprisonment because they could not pay lawyers’ fees.

Law Minister Ayaz Soomro said he would provide a list of such lawyers soon who had offered their services to plead hardship cases free.

Nusrat Abbasi and Abdul Sattar Rajpar pointed to the non-availability of urea fertiliser to growers and that officers of the revenue department and the DDO were involved in its black-marketing.

Agriculture Minister Ali Nawaz Shah said there was no shortage of fertilisers but the problem was distribution as dealers were involved in black-marketing. He said that out of the 514,000 tons, 413,000 tons of urea fertiliser had already been provided to the province, which came to 80 per cent of the requirement, and more ships were on the line to unload the fertiliser.

An MQM member pointed out that for the last 15 days the Dewan community was being harassed in Rato Dero. He said that although he had drawn the attention of the district police officer to it, no relief was provided to the community.

A minority MPA of the MQM pointed to the unsatisfactory performance of schools in Tharparkar, where children were not being looked after. He stressed the need for setting up monitoring teams.

Shahryar Mahar recalled the tragic incident of Jan 26 in Shikarpur in which four persons, including a four-year-old child, were brutally killed. He said although an FIR was registered, so far no action had been taken against the culprits, who were roaming free in Sukkur.