—Officials working in PM’s Office, NA, Senate, President House and FBR are getting more incentives than employs belonging to other government departments
—Government will keep $ 27.5 billion export target for the next fiscal year
ISLAMABAD: The federal government has decided to give importance to pensioners in the final budget that will be announced soon by the incumbent government. This move is intended to cover the gaps between the incentives provided to retired government employees and serving employees, Pakistan Today has been leaned.
The government would increase the pension by 15 per cent on the instructions of Prime Minister (PM) Shahid Khaqan Abbasi. Besides, a proposal to increase salaries by 10 per cent was also forwarded for consideration.
The government would present the budget on April 27 and its preparation had entered into the final stage. According to sources, the prime minister had given special instructions to the finance ministry to pay focus on pensioners. The government is in a position to earmark Rs 60 billion for pay and pension allowance, the sources added.
In addition to this, Abbasi had also instructed to balance the allowance of all federal government employees. Presently, some federal government employees working in the PM’s Office, National Assembly (NA), Senate, President House, and the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) were getting more incentives than those working in other government departments.
The sources further said that PM Abbasi also directed the officials concerned that there was no need to give more allowance to government officials employed in the above-mentioned departments if they were not putting in more effort in their work.
Moreover, the sources said the government might increase the house rent allowance of federal government employees by 40 per cent. The increase in house rent allowance was the main demand of employees and they were pursuing this matter for the last one and a half year.
Earlier, the prime minister’s secretary had given the approval to increase the house rent allowance by 50 per cent in the new budget.
In addition to this, the government would announce two packages which would include ways to increase exports of Pakistan and the other one would focus on providing incentives to farmers.
PM Abbasi had instructed the finance ministry officials to pay more attention to the expected export package. The government would keep a $ 27.5 billion export target for the next fiscal year.
The prime minister had also instructed the officials concerned to bring down the power subsidy to Rs 100 billion for the next year. Recently, the finance ministry had released Rs 20 billion for the power sector in addition to the already announced subsidy of Rs 119 billion. The government would keep Rs 221 billion for overall subsidies for the next fiscal year.
