The Senate was informed on Friday that the federal government was encouraging the use of electric vehicles in order to protect the environment and reduce dependence on imported fuel.
Minister for Law Azam Nazeer Tarar told the House during Question Hour that thirty electric buses have been imported from China. These buses have been stationed at Jinnah Convention Center in Islamabad where state of the art charging facilities have been made available.
Senator Azam apprised the Upper House of the Parliament that the National Database and Registration Authority would cover almost 11,777 union councils across the country to enhance its population data registration footprint at the grassroots level.
The Minister was responding to the question of Senator Fawia Arshad during the second meeting of the 340th session of the Senate.
Senator Tarar said the NADRA’s UC level initiative would be rolled out across the country, whereas initially 1150 UCs have been selected horizontally starting from the mega urban centers of the country covering every nook and corner and it would not be restricted to the Islamabad Capital Territory.
He added that there was a total of 11,777 UCs in the country and within 2.5 years small NADRA Centers would be established providing three main facilities of child registration certificate – Form B, Cancellation of NIC due to death, and NIC reprint or lost.
He added that NADRA had introduced motorbike teams to cater for disabled and elderly individuals and some 16,700 cases were addressed by those NADRA teams.
Senator Azam Nazeer Tarar, responding to a supplementary query of a Senator, explained that the mobile kit comprised of a camera stand, laptop, biometric and other required paraphernalia for facilitating elderly and specially-abled who were mostly unable to reach offices and mobile vans for their data registration.
He added that the mobile team initiative was being piloted in many districts, whereas urban areas with larger population were targeted first on priority and then the semi urban areas including hard areas would be targeted.
Taking the floor, Leader of the House Ishaq Dar assured that the privatization process will be taken forward in a transparent manner and due process will be followed. He however emphasized there should not be any politics on this matter.
The Leader of the House proposed formation of a special committee to ascertain why the privatization of Pakistan Steel Mills did not occur, which resulted in the loss of hundreds of billions of rupees.
