- author, Vasatullah Khan
- position, Analyst
Honorable Speaker National Assembly Ayaz Sadiq has done everything he could.
According to newspaper reports, on Tuesday morning at around three o’clock in the morning, the speaker took a strict notice of the operation of picking up around 10 Tehreek-e-Insaf members of the assembly and handing them over to the police stationed outside by masked men who entered the premises of the Parliament. Five security personnel including a chief of staff (Sergeant at Arms) and some low-level electrician-type workers on loan from the Capital Development Authority were temporarily suspended on demand (although their salaries were not suspended due to severe inflation).
The duty of these security personnel was to resist intruders in the parliamentary premises and disobey ‘mysterious orders’ to temporarily suspend power to the building. (Though this work is not being able to be done by the big state Tarim Khan, let alone these poor government officials..).
Honorable Speaker summoned IG Islamabad and verbally abused him. Perhaps Mr. Speaker has also asked the IG that your police was standing outside. How did the masked man get in? They were your servants or heavenly. Who sent them?
On this, the IG may have shrugged his shoulders or given an active assurance like ‘Yes sir, we will reach these people soon, insha’Allah. As every IG of Islamabad does after summoning in every court.
Perhaps the Speaker has also asked the IG to file a complaint against those who violated the sanctity of the parliamentary premises. Perhaps the IG also said ‘Yes sir, yes sir’ and said ‘Let us complete the preliminary investigation. Then you will do whatever you say, God willing.’
By the way, an inquiry committee consisting of four senior bureaucrats headed by an additional secretary has also been formed for an ‘independent and transparent investigation’ of the incident.
The committee will prepare a report on the security arrangements of Parliament and the movement of ‘unrelated elements’ within its premises. Then what will happen to the report? It is not clear.
But before the investigation started, Atta Tarar, the Minister of Information of the Speaker’s party, the PML-N government, blew a hole in the boat of a possible investigation by saying that no member of the assembly has been detained for breaking into the Parliament building. . However, in the CCT footage, only two MLAs are seen who were caught from the services branch of the Parliament House.
(It is as if the Minister of Information is giving the impression that the Speaker has decided to suspend the officials based on faulty information. The Speaker may not even know that the Services Branch of the Parliament is definitely in the Parliament premises but not a part of the Parliament. (So whatever happens there is beyond the jurisdiction of the custodian of Parliament).
The Speaker has also formed an eighteen-member committee consisting of opposition and government members to run the proceedings of the parliament smoothly. (Just like peace committees are formed on the occasion of Muharram and Rabi Awwal).
A lot has happened in the Parliament premises in the history of Pakistan. For example, on September 23, 1958, in the meeting of the East Pakistan Provincial Assembly held in Jagannath Hall of Dhaka University, when a resolution was rejected, a member of the assembly hit Deputy Speaker Shahid Ali Patwari on the head with a paper weight. Four days later, the injured Deputy Speaker died in the hospital.
In the year 1975, when the opposition rioted in the National Assembly held in the hall of State Bank Islamabad, on the order of the Speaker, the Sergeant-at-Arms and his security staff beat several members of the opposition including Maulana Mufti Mahmood. Respectfully placed on the ground in the parking lot.
Today, the members of the ruling PML-N in the parliament blame the riots and the use of foul language on the heads of the angry members of the PTI assembly. But in the 2012 budget session, the opposition Muslim League not only refused to listen to the speech of Finance Minister Dr. Hafeez Sheikh in the presence of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. Rather tear the budget books. Some members flocked to the Prime Minister. To save them, the members of the People’s Party formed a human chain and then the beating, killing, mother and sister started.
The mood was so uncontrollable that the helpless leader of the opposition Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan also sat down on his seat. Even then, like today, a Joint Parliamentary Committee was formed to conduct the proceedings of the House peacefully.
But on September 10, the incident of lifting the members of the parliament by breaking into the premises of the Parliament House is the first incident of its kind in which instead of the members of the parliament, masked persons of the subordinate institutions pulled the dupatta from the head of the mother of the constitution.
Minister of Defense Khawaja Asif, whose Parliamentary language has been discussed in four dangs of the world. He tried to describe the lifting of members from the Parliament premises as a continuation of the political tension instead of considering it as an unusual incident.
In August 2014, the opposition PTI, which showed the washed-up turtle vests on the iron fence of the same Parliament, is calling the September 10th incident the 9/11 of democracy, but on the other hand, the government is not ready to give more importance to it than a random accident. In these circumstances, the symbolic anger of Speaker Ayaz Sadiq on his own security staff is also a big deal. The custodian of the parliament found in Adar and what should he do?
As a child, I would cool off by pulling the ears of a goat tied up in the yard when my mother occasionally spanked me with an upturned broom or a clothespin.
Now the only concern is that this may be the first and last incident of its kind. Otherwise, the next picture could be that some mysterious men are taking some members out of the packed house with their hands in their armpits and the rest of the MNAs are indifferent thinking that thank God it is not us this time.