Sharif's party criticized for adopting to dirty politics

Islamabad, Nov.20 : Former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's led party Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) has been accused of stooping too low in politics after Rana Sanaullah, the PML-N law minister in the Punjab, flashed two controversial pictures on the steps of Punjab Assembly.

Two days ago Rana Sanaullah brandished two pictures to the media outside Punjab Assembly house. One of them showed the son of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer on a beach with two "girl friends". The other showed Taseer at a dinner table with family and friends at some private function, a bottle of Whisky on the table, the Daily Times wrote in its editorial "Dirty, mean and low" on Thursday.

Sanaullah has blamed Taseer of turning the Governor's House into a "den of sin".

Earlier, anonymous e-mailers had sent pictures culled from Facebook albums to all and sundry showing Taseer's 16-year-old daughter and 19-year-old son with school friends at family and class get-togethers. One rag in Islamabad actually printed the pictures.

The editorial described such acts as "most despicable smear campaign" against Taseer and his family. It undermines everything that our family-oriented culture holds dear and sacred, the privacy and sanctity of its "chardevari", Daily Times wrote.

The editorial stated that the Muslim League's dirty tricks department was as old as the party itself.

It recounted how the conservative Muslim League- Nawaz smeared former premier Benazir Bhutto and even Nusrat Bhutto during the 1988 elections by spraying the province with "computer-doctored" pictures of the two ladies in ostensibly "compromising" situations.

The Daily Times through its editorial questioned if it was a fair game for opponents to target wives and children of politicians.

"If it is so, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth policy would lead to many similar revelations about the secret wives and mistresses and errant children of many PMLN leaders and politicians. All the federal government has to do is to sic the Intelligence Bureau on them and play back their tapped phone conversations and SMSs to the salivating media," the editorial stated.

The write up cautioned that it shouldn't surprise anyone in coming days if the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) were now to "doctor" pictures of the Chief Minister of Punjab or dig up alleged or "doctored" skeletons from his family cupboard.

Behind this vicious personal campaign against Governor Taseer is a political tussle for control of the province. The PMLN opposed Taseer's appointment from day one because of his anti-Sharif credentials, which date back to the 1980s and 1990s when, as a PPP stalwart, he suffered imprisonment and torture at the hands of Sharif governments in the province.

Terming stooping so low in politics, the Daily Timessaid the act of PMLN as "personal, dirty, mean and low."

Two recent complaint letters by the Punjab Governor to the Punjab Chief Minister about the provincial government's policies or lack of them in certain areas seem to have provoked the latest personal attack on him, the Daily Times observed.

It would be unfortunate, but perfectly understandable, if the PPP were now to stoop to the same personal level to malign the PMLN crossing the perceived boundary (Chardevari), the Daily Times wrote.

ANI