CM Elahi takes vote of confidence as opposition walks out of PA.

LAHORE -- Following nine hours of political melodrama in the Punjab Assembly, Speaker Punjab Assembly Mohammad Sibtain Khan eventually declared after midnight that Punjab Chief Minister Ch Parvez Elahi had passed the floor test by securing 186 votes. The Opposition boycotted the voting process and left the House after the speaker did not accept their plea to conduct the voting through show of hand. The Opposition members surrounded the speaker's dais and hurled copies of the assembly agenda on the chair. During the counting process, the treasury and opposition members also threw chairs on each other as the speaker failed to restore order in the House. The trouble started when the PML-N's Mohammad Ahmad Khan wanted to take a point of order, but the speaker did not allow him to speak. He, however, kept speaking and demanded that two or three opposition members should be allowed to watch the counting process as polling agents if the trust vote proceedings could not be conducted through show of hand. The speaker did not accept this demand too which prompted the opposition to boycott the voting process and stage a walkout from the assembly. Later, talking to the media outside Punjab Assembly, Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah said the treasury had bulldozed the confidence vote by not following set procedure. 'The proceeding is illegal and unconstitutional. 'How can the chief minister obtain trust vote from the Assembly when the matter is sub-judice and the governor's order is under suspension as...