PAKISTAN: MNA charges PTV with blacking out National Assembly resolution

Bhandara says that PTV censored Quaid-i-Azam's 1947 speech to locals, desecrated speech to pander to religious groups

Dawn
Monday, January 24, 2005

ISLAMABAD: A ruling party MNA has charged the PTV with blacking out a news in its main Khabarnama on the unanimous adoption of a resolution by the National Assembly on including in the curricula the full text of Quaid-i-Azam's 11th August speech to the Constituent Assembly in 1947.

The charge sheet against the PTV was contained in a breach of privilege motion moved by MNA MP Bhandara for the second time on Jan 19. Earlier, he had filed a similar motion on October 21, 2004.

"In keeping with the policy to censor the above speech, PTV Khabarnama on 19th October made no mention of the unanimous decision of this assembly to include the full text of his (the Quaid's) speech in the curricula," said Mr Bhandara in the motion.

However, Mr Bhandara said: "The news was carried on PTV World to impress the audiences outside the country - a manifestation of our official dichotomy to show the moderate face of Pakistan outside the country and to pander to bigotry within."

The motion said the Quaid's speech had been consistently downplayed by the Government of Pakistan since 1949. "Parts of the speech have been materially altered or omitted all together in the past," he said.

The MNA said on the one hand tremendous respect was shown to the memory of the Quaid, on the other his political thoughts were desecrated to pander to our religious groups. "What greater insult to the memory of the founder of this nation than censoring the parts of his 11th August 1947 speech?"

The MNA asked the National Assembly Secretariat to take up the issue during the 23rd session of the Lower House, as this omission of the PTV Khabarnama resulted not only in his breach of privilege but also of the House as a whole.

When contacted for official views on the breach of privilege motion, Minister for Information Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said the omission by the PTV Khabarnama did not amount to a breach of privilege.

He said the MNAs had made it a practice to move breach of privilege motions on unnecessary issues. He said the government would respond to the breach of privilege motion as and when it was taken up by the National Assembly.

In reply to a question, the minister said he did not believe in instructing the PTV Khabarnama to include or exclude certain news items from its broadcast. He said everyone should respect the editorial independence of the PTV.

Date Posted: 1/24/2005