The Sindh government has stopped direct funding to the Pakistan Rangers Sindh from the forthcoming financial year, provincial Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said on Saturday.
Speaking at a post-budget press conference, he told reporters that the provincial government had been releasing funds to the Rangers Sindh directly from year 2000 by considering it a provincial department.
However, the provincial government’s funds would be released through the Home Department from the new financial year. He said the provincial government had also reduced the Rangers’ funds from Rs 1 billion to Rs 360 million in the fiscal budget 2011-12. Besides, the government had also abolished inter-security allowance for Rangers personnel deployed in Sindh.
To a question, the minister said the federal government was providing a major allocation of funds to the Rangers deployed in Sindh, about Rs 6.5 billion annually.
He did not give reasons for curtailing the Rangers funds and abolishment of the inter-security allowance being paid by the provincial government. But it is believed that the PPP-led coalition government in the province wants to strengthen the police force gradually.
The finance minister said Rs 31.46 billion have been kept for the Sindh Police in the new financial year’s budget, which is 2.41 percent above last year’s allocation of Rs 30.71 billion. He said 41 new Cost Centres (drawing and disbursement offices) had been created with a view to decentralise financial powers to police stations to improve the working conditions of police personnel at the police station-level.
“Allocations for Pakistan Rangers and Frontier Constabulary as separate Cost Centres have been discontinued, and in order to meet their essential emergency expenditure, separate allocations have been provided in the Home Department’s budget.