Malik Meraj Khalid

Tenure: 5th November, 1996 - 17th February, 1997
Total duration: 104 days (3 months, 12 days)

Malik Meraj Khalid was born in 1916, in a small village near Lahore. He studied Law and began his practice in 1948. He was elected to the Provincial Assembly in 1965. He joined the Pakistan Peoples Party soon after its inception in 1968 and was appointed President of Lahore P. P. P. He was re-elected to the National Assembly in 1970.

Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto included Meraj Khalid in his Cabinet as Minister for Food and Agriculture and Under-Developed Areas in December 1971. In November 1972, he was appointed Chief of the Party’s Parliamentary Affairs, and in 1975 he was given the portfolios of Social Welfare, Local Government and Rural Development. Later he was elected Speaker of the National Assembly.

After the execution of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in April 1979, he was nominated member of the P. P. P. Central Committee. But he resigned in January 1988. He was again appointed as Speaker of the National Assembly in 1988. He lost the elections in 1993, and remained aloof from politics for sometime and served as the Rector of International Islamic University.

He was nominated as the Prime Minister of the interim Government in November 1996 and remained in power till February 1997.