Islamabad, 24th October 2017: The 29th meeting of the Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication was held in the Committee Room No. 7, (4th Floor), Parliament House, Islamabad. Sr. P.S to Hon. Chairman informed the Committee that due to some personal engagements the Hon. Chairman could not attend the today meeting. Therefore, the Committee unanimously decided that Syed Ali Raza Abidi, MNA/Member may proceed the Committee meeting as the Chairman under rule 216(2) of the Rule of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the National Assembly, 2007.

2. The meeting was started with the recitation from the Holy Quran. Then, the Committee decided to proceed with the given agenda.

3. The Committee unanimously confirmed the minutes of its previous meeting held on 12th July, 2017.

4. The Chairman, Pakistan Telecommunication (PTA) briefed the Committee about the actions taken by PTA against the Blasphemous material on social media. When the Committee called the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) about their actions against the Blasphemous material on social media; nobody was present in the meeting to respond.  The Committee showed its displeasure on FIA for not attending the meeting and directed that FIA must be attended the next meeting and brief the Committee about the Blasphemous material on social media.

5. Then, the departmental representative from Universal Services Fund (USF) briefed the Committee about their performance during the financial year 2017-18. The Committee appreciated the performance of the USF. Thereafter, the representative of Special Communication Organization (SCO) briefed the Committee about their performance during the financial year 2017-18 along with they showed their some grievances with the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication. The Committee appreciated the performance of SCO and directed the Ministry that SCO may be treated equally as per other private national or international organizations. Further, the Committee directed that in next meeting of the Committee SCO may be taken on Agenda.
 
6. The Committee took up the TIP employee’s issues and directed that TIP employee’s issue will also be taken on next meeting agenda. Further, the Committee directed Chairman, PTA to launch public awareness through media that who we could get raid of from the curse of “Blue Whale Game”.  

7. The Hon. MNAs/Member Mehar Ishtiaq Ahmad, Ms. Zahra Wadood Fatemi, Sardar Kamal Khan Chang, Mr. Amjid Ali Khan, Engineer Dawar Khan Kundi, Ms. Shahjehan Muneer Mangrio and Ch. Muhammad Tufail attended the meeting. The senior officers from the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication, PTA and S.C.O were also attended the meeting.