Govt prorogued PA session to avoid protest, claims opposition.

ISLAMABAD: The government prorogued the 14th session of the Punjab Assembly within a week despite the fact that it was supposed to continue for two weeks.

Both the opposition parties - the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan People's Party (PPP) claimed that the government didn't want to continue the session for two weeks due to the recent surfacing of some key developments that included the increasing cases of dengue, the child abuse cases in Chunian, the arrest of PPP's leader Syed Khursheed Shah and the production orders of Hamza Shahbaz.

Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Raja Basharat claimed in his pre-session briefing that the session would continue for two weeks, as the government had a lot of business on the agenda items. The order read by Deputy Speaker Sardar Dost Muhammad Mazari on Friday to adjourn the session sine die was equally surprising for the opposition and journalists sitting in the Press Gallery as all were expecting that it will continue in the second week. PML-N lawmaker Rana Mashhood said earlier on a point of order that he came to know that the session will be prorogued for indefinite time period today and he added that it would be tantamount to suppress the voice of the people of Punjab. "The Speaker gave us commitment in the House that he will talk to the CM and parliamentary party of PTI for the production orders of the opposition leader Hamza Shahbaz for this session and now they are going to prorogue it," he said. He further added that the government isn't facing the criticism of opposition and therefore it opted to prorogue it early.

PPP's parliamentary leader Syed Hassan Murtaza was of the...