The Sindh Assembly (SA) on Monday started general discussion on the provincial budget for fiscal year 2011-12, with most of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) legislators terming it balanced and people-friendly, and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) lawmakers demanding funds for projects in Karachi.
Starting the discussion, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q)’s Abdul Razaque Rahimoon alleged that the government’s claim of cutting down on non-developmental expenditures is not true as the government has allocated Rs 190 million for purchase of new vehicles for government departments.
“The government has also failed to provide a break up of funds spent by town/taluka municipal committees (TMAs), which were given Rs 30 million each during the current fiscal year,” he added.
The government proudly mentioned imparting technical training to some 80,000 youth in different fields but there was no word on how many of them were employed, said the PML-Q leader.
Expressing his concern over the state of education in the province, Rahimoon said the government had allocated billions of rupees for the education sector, but no improvement has been seen. The education minister talks on almost all the issues in the assembly except for education to which he looks after, he added.
Participating in the general discussion on budget, PPP member Dr Sikandar Mandhro said that no improvement was seen on ground in different sectors as around Rs 61 billion of budget allocations are embezzled every year. He suggested that the progress report on implementation of Annual Development Programme (ADP) should be presented in the assembly on quarterly basis, so that the representative house could oversee progress on ADP.
MQM’s Muhammad Aadil Khan said the government has earmarked funds for Karachi but these should equally be distributed in 18 towns of the city. “An information technology centre should be established in each MPA’s constituency,” he suggested.
PPP’s Dr Ahmed Ali Shah said that an insufficient increase of funds has been made in the agriculture sector which is the backbone of the country as well as the province’s economy.
“The Federal government has discontinued its National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses (NPIW) and therefore the provincial government should accommodate the employees in provincial set up,” he said, also demanding that the Sindhi language should be given the status of national language.
Naheed Begum of MQM was of the view that the province’s 48 percent agriculture land is barren and the government should take steps for irrigating such lands while the land owners should be brought into the tax net.
Participating in the debate, PPP’s Anwar Maher claimed that the suggestions made by lawmakers were not included in the budget despite the government arranged briefings before finalising the budget.
He suggested that the province should build its own power houses as electricity is the most important issue of the day.
“The provincial government should take steps for preservation of natural resources, as after the end of Balochistan’s gas reserves, the gas reserves in Sindh would also be utilised in the near future,” said Maher, adding that Sukkur – the third biggest city of the province – was not given funds according to its needs.
MQM member Moin Aamir Pirzada said the government has not prioritised sectors in allocations in the budget as per its briefings given by the lawmakers. As per the prior briefings, the government should have given top priority to irrigation and road sectors in the budgetary allocations.
“The Finance Department has unilaterally discontinued funding to various schemes in the budget on which at least Rs 5 billion had already been spent,” he complained.
He also expressed his displeasure on showing the budget as surplus, saying that as an underdeveloped province, the province should not have a surplus budget.
Drawing the government’s attention towards inflation, price hike and poverty in the province, MQM’s Bilqees Mukhtar said that common people were facing hardships in their routine life and are forced to sell their children.
Referring to the list of 10 essential commodities with their prices in the market, she said the people do not want mega projects and huge investments but only need their basic problems to be resolved.
An overall lack of interest of members in the general discussion was observed, as SA Deputy Speaker Shehla Raza had to repeatedly ask assembly members, including ministers, for observing silence and taking their seats. Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah was seen busy in taking notes during the speeches of members.
The house would continue the general discussion on budget on Tuesday also.
