KARACHI: In what appears to be an attempt to deny any differences within the party, the beleaguered leadership of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakist an (MQM-P) sat together at their temporary headquarters on Sunday and declared a resolution passed by the Sindh Assembly against the creation of new provinces an `attack on the federation` and asked whether any province has the right to pass a resolution in contravention to the Constitution of Pakistan.

Rumours of an unannounced split in the MQM-P have been the talk of the town for the past many months, but an incident in the Sindh Assembly on Friday, in which a party MPA told the house that he belonged to Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui`s group of the party and he was threatened by lawmakers belonging to the defunct PSP group, brought the organisational infighting into the open.

While the MQM-P was struggling to cope with the fallout of Friday`s incident, the Sindh Assembly on Saturday passed a resolution moved by Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah against the division of Sindh, declaring Karachi an `inseparable part` of the province.

To show unity, senior leaders Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, Federal Health Minister Mustafa Kamal and Dr Farooq Sattar, along with others, first held a meeting at their temporary head-quarters and then addressed a press conference together.

`Yesterday, a resolution against the Constitution of Pakistan was passed by one assembly of Pakistan.

A province had carried itself as if it were a separate country,` Dr Siddiqui said while referring to Sindh.

Accompanied by Dr Sattar, Mr Kamal, Anis Kaimkhani, Aminul Haque and Faisal Subzwari, he asked the public and the `intellectuals` of Sindh whether any province could pass a resolution that `went against the Constitution` `This [resolution] challenged Pakistan, its Constitution, its law and its state,` he remarked, noting that it was being done by the party that had been in power in the province for the past 17 years.

Dr Siddiqui contendedthat Article 239 of the Constitution provided the procedure for establishing new provinces.

`This resolution is not against any demand of ours but against Pakistan`s Constitution, its state, presence and the PPP leader [Zulfikar Ali Bhutto]),` he said.

The MQM-P leader also referred to Articles 246 and 248 of the Constitution, which he said gave presidential powers for `extraordinary circumstances`.

He recalled that the MQM-P had demanded the empowerment of local governments even at the time of the 26th Amendment, when `the Pakistani state, government and democracy were in dire need of us`.

He emphasised that the solution to the issue was `dialogue, not threats`.

`What fear made youtable this resolution?` he asked, asserting that no demand ever made by the MQM-P was in violation of the Constitution.

`The incident and trauma that Pakistan suffered in 1970, a show of solidarity had to be made after that. Then what happened? The Punjab Assembly declared Urdu its provincial language.

Sarhad (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) and Balochistan also chose Urdu as their provincial language,` he said.

However, Sindh, he said, was the only province which didn`t do so because the ruling party here had `other dreams and intentions, which have been proved today`.

`As long as we are here, every dream of establishing Sindhudesh will be shattered,` he declared.

`As long as we are here, we cannot let this hap-pen.

Speaking about the country`s electoral history, he said that in the elections of the 1970s, there wasn`t a single candidate representing the PPP from West Pakistan, i.e. 55 per cent of the country, declaring itself a lingual party.

`Today, a party with a manufactured majority has held control of Sindh since 1972. I want to ask the state of Pakistan: is there any other province where such segregation exists along linguistic lines? In 1970, the quota system was not merely an administrative arrangement; it was structured on the basis of language,` he said.

Dr Siddiqui, who is a federal minister in Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif`s cabinet, then questioned the premier, the president, the state of Pakistan,the judiciary, and the nation at large, asking whether the kind of treatment meted out to Sindh`s cities has ever been seen in any other part of Pakistan.

He said that whenever anyone raises their voice for their rights in Sindh, they are branded as traitors.

He further said that the MQM-P had `never made any demands that go against the interests of Pakistan`.

The MQM-P leader recalled that in 2008, Karachi was among the rapidly developing cities, but 17 years of PPP rule pushed it to the list of world`s least liveable cities.

Addressing the PM, he said it was his duty to enforce the Constitution, which also allows for a referendum.

As the Jamaat-i-Islami and Pakistan Tehreek-iInsaf had also supported the PPP resolution in the Sindh Assembly, the MQM-P leader was critical of both parties.

He said JI chief Hafiz Naeem ur Rehman was part of a conspiracy against Karachi. He criticised PTI for joining hands with PPP in `anticonstitution moves`.

`If there`s a transparent census, the demand for a separate province will come from somewhere else, not Karachi,` he said.

Sharjeel responds Reacting to the press conference, Sindh Senior Minister Sharjeel Inam Memon stated that both Dr Siddiqui and Mr Kamal are federal ministers, and such statements by federal ministers raise questions about whether they reflect the policy of the federal government.

He added that the federal government should clarify why its two fed-eral ministers and coalition partner are consistently engaged in propaganda and conspiracies against the Sindh government.

He said it was unfortunate that the MQM-P leaders did not study the Constitution; otherwise, they would haverefrained from making such irresponsible statements.

He said that the country was already facing political and economic challenges, and in such circumstances, it was unwise to create tension between the federation and the provinces.