All major political parties, including the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) were divided over ‘The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill, 2019′, while a majority of female legislators supported the bill.
The bill exposed divisions even within the PTI government’s rank and file, as the cabinet members openly expressed conflicting views on it. The bill appeared in the National Assembly a day after the Senate approved it with a majority vote. According to the amendment, marriage under 18 years could lead to a fine of Rs 200,000 and three years of rigorous imprisonment for the facilitators.
Though the bill was passed and referred to the National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights, Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Mohammad Khan and Minister for Religious Affairs Noorul Haq Qadri openly opposed it, while Minister for Human Right Shireen Mazari and Minister for Planning and Development Khusro Bakhtiar supported the bill. The PTI’s minority MNA Dr Ramesh Kumar Vankwani presented the bill, in which he sought an increase in minimum age allowed to enter into marriage to 18 years. Ali Mohammad Khan informed the House that the Ministry of Interior had opposed the bill. He also informed the House that such a bill was presented by Marvi Memon and others in 2016, but that was rejected by the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII). He also claimed that the House was not allowed to make any legislation that was against the Islamic laws. In Islam, marriage is related to puberty, not age, he argued, and claimed that he was ready to resign if any law contradicting Islamic values was passed by the House. He recommended that it should be sent to the CII for deliberation.
Noorul Haq Qadri also opposed the bill in the current form, which according to him was against Islam. He also suggested sending the bill to the CII for its members’ valuable comments.
However, Shireen Mazari said the House could not pass any legislation against the Islamic law, but setting the age of 18 for marriage was not against Islam. She said the UAE, Turkey and Bangladesh had already set the age limit to 18 for marriage, and wondered why it couldn’t be set in Pakistan. “Even Egypt adopted such a law with taking comments from Al-Azhar. Apart from it, the previous governments have also signed some international agreements,” she argued.
When the deputy speaker asked for counting over the bill, members of the PTI, PPP and PML-N were divided over the matter. However, the bill got 72 votes in its support, while only 50 people opposed it. It was passed and referred to the NA Committee on Human Rights.
Over a policy statement, Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Omar Ayub said that since August last, the PTI government had not passed on the burden of over Rs 150 billion in the wake of increasing crude prices to the consumers, and provided a shield to the people. He said petroleum prices were less in Pakistan as compare to other oil importing nations like China, Turkey, India and South Africa. The minister said that Prime Minister Imran Khan and the cabinet deliberated upon the recommendations of the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) regarding petroleum prices. He said that it has been decided to refer the matter to the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for further debate and a final decision to determine petroleum prices.
The National Assembly unanimously passed two resolutions moved by Riaz Fatyana. The first resolution urged the federal government to restore the regulatory customs duty on cotton import without any delay to prevent massive import and dumping of cotton, and set a minimum support price for the crop to protect farmers and encourage cotton cultivation in the country.
On the eve of World Labour Day, the House, through the second resolution, recognised the rights of every worker – formal and informal – in Pakistan. The House also committed to investing time and effort to reduce economic gap in development-oriented poverty reduction focus and gender equitable mechanism. The resolution also stated that the House would put in all efforts to ensure that all UN conventions on labour rights ratified by Pakistan time to time were fulfilled.
Nine bills were introduced in the House on the day. They are: ‘The Control of Narcotics Substances (Amendment) Bill, 2019’, ‘The Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2019’ (Article 1, 5, 59, 106, 175 A and 2018), which is aimed at creation of Hazara province in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on administrative basis, ‘The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill, 2019’, ‘The Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2019’ (Article 1, 5, 59, 106, 154, 175 A, 198 and 2018) aimed at creating Hazara, South Punjab, Bahawalpur provinces, ‘The Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2019 (Article 51, 76 and 106)’, ‘The Disabled Persons (Employment and Rehabilitation) (Amendment) Bill, 2019’, ‘The Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues (Amendment) Bill, 2019’, ‘The Islamabad Capital Territory Prohibition of Corporal Punishment Bill, 2019’, and ‘The Pakistan Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019.’
