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       PESHAWAR: Treasury members in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Monday resented “restrictions” on meetings with incarcerated PTI leader Imran Khan despite court orders and called for a sitting of the house outside Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail where the former prime minister has been detained.

       During an assembly session here with Deputy Speaker Suriya Bibi in the chair, the lawmakers said that sitting should continue until party leadership, personal physician and wife Bushra Bibi were allowed to see Imran in jail.

       Higher education minister Meena Khan Afridi complained that the former prime minister was denied meetings despite the court’s orders.

       He said the PTI approached all available forums for relief, but to no avail.

       Call for assembly session outside Adiala Jail

       “Imran Khan is the hope for this country. How long will this injustice towards him continue? I demand a provincial assembly session outside Adiala Jail until his free trial is held and the PTI leadership and personal physician are allowed to meet with him,” he said.

       PTI MPA Shafiullah Jan said that the political leadership decided the country’s policies and criticised the establishment for saying that anybody, who had issued with the policy, should leave the country.

       He insisted that the Adiala Prison’s administration didn’t follow the jail manual.

       “We know who is doing all this. The jail manual is being violated on the orders of a colonel,” he alleged.

       The lawmaker said during detention, PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif and PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari used to meet 100 people at a time.

       He said that after Mr Imran became the prime minister, the country would have an independent foreign policy and the military would be asked to protect borders only.

       Mr Jan said the PTI leadership as well as the KP Assembly should be taken on board before the launch of any military operation in the province.

       He flayed “stolen public mandate, imprisonment of political leaders, and imposition of undeclared martial law” in the country.

       Earlier, opposition members questioned transparency in the distribution of financial assistance to deserving people during the last Ramazan.

       Adnan Khan of the JUI-F said the provincial government had decided to task political representatives to distribute the Ramazan Package cash handouts to people and even Rs1 billion was given away to 100,000 people, but no one engaged him for it in Bannu though he was an elected member from the district. He requested the chair to refer the matter to the relevant house committee for discussion and recommendations.

       PPP member Ahmad Karim Kundi said if such matters were not referred to the house’s committees, the National Accountability Bureau and anti-corruption establishment would investigate it.

       Arbab Usman of the ANP said he put the same question to the government five months ago but got no response.

       “I asked several persons in my area but they didn’t receive the financial assistance,” he said, calling for a “performance audit.”

       JUI-F lawmaker Riaz Shaheen said according to the department’s reply to the question, 2,000 people received the financial assistance in Kurram tribal district, but he wondered when Zakat committees hadn’t been formed, who distributed the financial assistance.

       He said that he had submitted a list of deserving people from the area who had never received cash handouts.

       Law minister Aftab Alam Afridi said almost 40 per cent of the names of the deserving people were dropped from the financial assistance list as they didn’t fulfil the criteria prescribed for the Benazir Income Support Programme and Ehsas Programme. He said that more names were added.

       The minister asked the chair for a vote as the treasury didn’t favour the referring of the question to the relevant house committee.

       Housing minister Dr Amjad said the financial assistance was provided through BISP, so the government had no role in the matter. He opposed the referring of the question to the house committee.

       JUI-F member Rehana Ismail said the upcoming Ramazan Package would also face the same issues.

       She said the cash handout’s distribution should be done in a transparent manner.

       Treasury member Abdul Salam Afridi said the government had reserved a 10 per cent job quota for employees of the Civil Secretariat and Provincial Management Services, while employees of other departments were ignored and no quota was reserved for them.

       He said the KP Public Service Commission advertised posts.

       “One advertisement mentioned 55 seats for the entire province but another advertisement had 36 posts but only the Civil Secretariat’s employees were entitled to apply for them. The second advertisement should be withheld and the matter should be sent to the house’s committee for consideration,” he said.

       The law minister said that the issue could be discussed and the rules revisited. The chair later referred the matter to the assembly’s committee through voting.

       The house also passed a resolution, moved by MPA Obaidur Rehman, for electric supply to the Dir district.

       The resolution read that the Koto hydropower project in Dir district, which was inaugurated in 2015 and completed in 2019, produced 41 megawatts, with Nepra receiving one unit for Rs8.24 and earning Rs1.7 billion.

       The resolution said that electricity should be provided to Dir district at the rate of Rs8.24 per unit and supply the rest to the national grid otherwise the Nepra rate should be enhanced from Rs8.24 to Rs30 per unit and the district’s income should be enhanced from 10 per cent to 20 per cent.

       The assembly also passed the KP Control of Narcotics Substances Amendment Bill, 2025, which was tabled by excise and taxation minister Khaleequr Rehman.

       The chair later put off the sitting until 2pm on April 7.

       Published in Dawn, March 4th, 2025