Dawn of Parliamentary Democracy: A Study of the First Elected National Assembly of Pakistan.

Post-general elections' 1970 developments resulted in the loss of eastern wing of Pakistan and creation of a new country on the world's map naming Bangladesh; consisting of the region previously known as East Pakistan. After December 1971(creation of Bangladesh), it was only West Pakistan which made a new beginning with a directly elected National Assembly (NA), Lower House of the Parliament. In this scenario, the state faced many challenges among which the most critical was formulation of a constitution, acceptable for remaining federating units of Pakistan, to save it from any further national loss and create harmony and cohesion among the federating units as a federal state. To fulfill this responsibility, the first directly elected National Assembly of Pakistan started functioning under the leadership of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and the Pakistan Peoples' Party (PPP). This assembly completed one of its major tasks of formulating a constitution for Pakistan in 1973 and was dissolved in January 1977 to conduct second general elections in Pakistan. The present paper is focused on the functioning of the National Assembly to analyze its working considering it as the basis of democracy in contemporary Pakistan. In this paper an attempt is made to answer the questions like how serious the business of Assembly was taken by the members? What were the attitudes of the members towards adjournments motions and during the question-and-answer session? How seriously were taken the budget sessions? Was there any constructive criticism on the government policies during the budget sessions? Since the attitude of members of the first National Assembly provided basis for the democratic system, answers to these questions may help to understand the contemporary practices inside the National Assembly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]