Pakistan’s parliament on Tuesday descended into chaos after lawmakers from the treasury and the Opposition hurled abuses and threw copies of official budget documents at each other, injuring one of the female members.

The lower house of parliament, the National Assembly, was convened to hold a debate on the 2021-22 budget which was presented by finance minister Shaukat Tarin on Friday.

The treasury benches began a noisy protest when the leader of the Opposition, Shahbaz Sharif, attempted to make the customary speech to open the forum for debate on the budget.

Within no time, the House turned into a battlefield when some lawmakers came face to face, leading to exchange of hot words followed by abuses and finally the throwing of copies of the budget documents.

A video clip showing the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) leader, Ali Awan, shouting expletives at the Opposition went viral on social media. At least one PTI female lawmaker, Maleka Bokhari, was treated after a document hit her on her eye. However, no serious damage was done.

Shahbaz, the president of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), later tweeted that the PTI was a fascist party.

“Today the whole nation saw on their TV screens how the ruling party resorted to hooliganism & even naked abuse. Only goes to show how ethically shallow Imran Khan and his whole party are and how PTI has turned into a fascist and abusive party. Unfortunate!” he tweeted.

Information minister Fawad Chaudhry said the PML-N was responsible for the unrest.