The Senate standing committee on cabinet secretariat has asked Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) to give a detailed briefing to the panel on how prices of different petroleum products were fixed. The committee, which met here with Senator Shahid Hassan Bugti in the chair, maintained that Ogra had completely failed to defend consumers' rights and there was a big question mark on role as autonomous body.
The committee noted though there is a problem of circular debt, this is no way to burden the consumers already bearing the pinch of skyrocketing inflation in the country especially in the case of utilities and food items. The Orgra officials said their role is just monitoring, they follow government policy laid down by the government and make all-out efforts for masses weal. When asked about the alleged corruption while awarding CNG stations' licences, the officials said that on prime minister's directives in April, the authority had banned issuing new licences for setting up CNG stations for a period of six months. The committee suspended discussion on LNG policy, 2011 till next meeting.
Meanwhile, the parliamentary body discussed development of Arts and Craft Village (ACV), Islamabad. The chairman Capital Development Authority (CDA) Imtiaz Inayat Elahi said that the ACV was the culmination of a vision jointly shared by the Indus Heritage Trust (IHT) and the civic body.
He said that the idea to build ACV was conceived from Dilli Haat - a combination food plaza and craft bazaar located in the heart of Delhi [India], which has stalls representing each state of India, giving a complete variety of tastes available all over India.
Imtiaz said that the ACV would promote Pakistani culture and handicrafts, as it would provide an opportunity to the foreigners and domestic visitors to visit the village and see regional cultures and traditional crafts at one place. He claimed that besides providing an opportunity to the artists and artisans from all over Pakistan to introduce their traditional products in the market, the ACV would help mix regional cultures to promote inter-provincial harmony.
The village would also help promote Pakistan's soft image abroad and project the folk and modern architecture of Pakistan. About 95 percent work on the project, he added, has been completed while the remaining work would be completed soon. The meeting was attended by Senators Fouzia Fakhar-uz-Zaman, Najma Hameed, Dr Safdar Abbasi, Saeeda Iqbal, Rehana Yahya Baloch, Malik Salahuddin Dogar and Abdul Ghaffar Qureshi.
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