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A joint resolution on Wednesday drew the MQM lawmakers' support during the Sindh Assembly session that demanded MQM founder Altaf Hussain's trial under Article 6 for making an anti-Pakistan speech and instigating workers to attack a private TV channel. The MQM termed the 'incident' of anti-Pakistan slogans and subsequent violence at a TV channel during the party's hunger strike camp set up outside Karachi Press Club as 'very sad' on August 22. However, the ruling PPP called for not 'punishing' the entire community for one person's fault.

MQM's parliamentary leader, Syed Sardar Ahmed, presented a resolution in the house to censure his party's founder for anti-Pakistan speech and instigating workers to attack a private TV channel. Visitors' galleries echoed with 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans while the PPP, PTI and PML-F were presenting their own resolutions to condemn the MQM's founder. Opposition leader in the house, MQM's Khawaja Izhar-ul-Hasan, assured the house that his party would never let any secret agency, including the Indian 'RAW', to cause unrest in Karachi.

Following the anti-Pakistan speech on August 22, the party had decided to disassociate itself from the London leadership immediately, he told the house, saying that "that night was not less than a doomsday". He described the incident of August 22 as 'very sad' and showed his party's support to the continuing Karachi operation. He cried during a speech on the joint resolution.

"We amended the party's manifesto to scrape party's leader's name and presented a resolution in the house against the party's founder, which is never an easy task to do," he said and asked that there should also be an action against those chanting 'Pakistan Zindabad' but also plundering the nation. He said that his party and community members never thought of committing disloyalty to their motherland - Pakistan.

MQM's under-trial legislator, Rauf Siddiqui, who was brought to the house, said that his party had jettisoned his founder and preferred Pakistan to him. "There is no compromise on Islam and Pakistan," he told the house, saying that "we have severed ties with those who had raised slogans outside Karachi Press Club". He said the same MQM had also raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' chants at the same press club.

MQM's lawmaker, Faisal Sabzwari, termed the anti-Pakistan incident as 'unfortunate' and 'unpleasant', saying that the hunger strike camp was just an effort to draw the government's attention towards party's issues. "Our politics revolved around one person for whom we sacrificed our lives and today we are severing ties with him just for the sake of our beloved country, though it is a difficult decision to make," he added.

He said: "Mohajirs were never traitors, nor are they and would never be. We have never been disloyal to Mohajirs, nor are we and never would we be". PML-F legislator, Mehtab Akbar Rashdi, said that "those migrated to Pakistan should not call themselves Mohajirs; rather they are Pakistanis". She appreciated the MQM lawmakers for their decision in relation to party's founder.

PTI's Khurram Sherzaman Khan, who was one of the resolution presenters, called Altaf Hussain 'traitor and friend of RAW', saying that "the state should have taken action against Altaf Hussain for speaking against Pakistan". PML-F's legislator, Nusrat Sehar Abbasi, underscored need for a legislation to punish Altaf Hussain. She urged the house to go beyond adopting resolution and take a practical step to bring traitors to justice.

Senior Sindh Food and Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Nisar Khuhro said that the entire community should not be censured for one person's wrong speech. He also called extremism on the basis of ethnicity as 'bad' as religious one. He lauded the MQM lawmakers for showing 'remorse' for their party founder's anti-state speech. The assembly will now sit on Thursday morning.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2016


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