Islamabad: Senator Irfan Siddiqui sought help from the Prime Minister on the missing bill to amend the Criminal Code Act.
Senator Irfan Siddiqui, the leader of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, has contacted the caretaker Prime Minister to trace his missing bill and said that the disappearance of the bill is a matter of the dignity and supremacy of the Parliament. He should be helped to trace the lost bill in the Prime Minister’s House.
In a letter to Caretaker Prime Minister Anwarul Haq, Senator Irfan Siddiqui said that he had submitted a bill to amend the Criminal Code Act in January 2022. After the unanimous recommendation of the relevant standing committee, the bill was unanimously approved in the Senate on 23 May 2022, after which the bill went to the National Assembly, which unanimously approved it on 8 June 2022.
According to the letter, the National Assembly Secretariat sent the bill to the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs on June 20, 2022 for further action. The Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs sent the bill to the Prime Minister’s Office on June 21 to send it to the Presidency for presidential assent. Senator Irfan Siddiqui told the Caretaker Prime Minister that almost 17 months have passed on June 21, 2022, but there is no trace of this bill, while the House of Representatives has clarified that the said bill has not reached the President.
In his letter to the Prime Minister, Senator Irfan Siddiqui further stated that despite the contacts between the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and the Senate Standing Committee on Interior Affairs, no response is being received from the Prime Minister’s Office regarding this bill. Therefore, I request you to help me in finding this bill because it is a matter of dignity and supremacy of Parliament and not of my bill.
It should be noted that Senator Irfan Siddiqui, as a private member, presented the Criminal Code (Amendment Bill) 2022 in the Senate, in which legislation was enacted to abolish the judicial powers of the district administration of Islamabad, but both houses of Parliament After its approval, the bill was lost in the Prime Minister’s House, which could not be traced till now.