 He received 70,116 votes and defeated Makhdoom Shahabuddin.In the same election, he also ran for the seat of the Provincial Assembly of the Punjab as a candidate of PML-Q from Constituency PP-291 (Rahim Yar Khan-VII) but was unsuccessful.On 4 September 2004, he was inducted into the federal cabinet of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and was appointed as Minister of State for Foreign Affairs.