Daily Times

The law makers of Upper House of parliament on Thursday regretted over 50 percent cut on development budget on ministry of Information Technology and lamented on how Pakistan would compete with India in IT development.

India was on top in software export spending huge amount of developmental funds on promotion of IT.While in Pakistan, it was bad luck that 50 budget cut was imposed on its development. Federal Secretary ministry of IT Maroof Afzal was of the view that the ministry demanded more funds for completion of its developmental projects. The senators expressed these views while speaking at Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication, which held today in parliament house while Senator Rubina Khalid was on the chair. While deliberating the over the budget allocation and its utilization by the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication, the Secretary said that original budget allocation was Rs3.046 billion, budget cut the new government (@50 percent), Rs1.597 billion; revised allocation was PKR 1.448 billion. Total releases to the ministry by end of Dec 2018 was Rs369.401 million while the ministry utilized Rs275.091 million.

The Committee showed grave displeasure over the massive decrease and stressed the need for these funds to be restored. Senator A. Rehman Malik was of the view that around the world, especially in India great emphasis was given to IT projects and software development. This was the only thing that would take Pakistan forward, he asserted.

Senator Sana Jamali was of the view that if Pakistan wished to compete with India it was imperative that attention be paid to this area. If such massive cut was imposed over this important sector then how it would reap the potential exists in IT sector. Instead of giving more funds to IT, it was regretted that half of its funds were taken off, she maintained.

The issues taken up by the committee included the bi-annual review of the budgetary allocation and its utilization; and lack of services of Pakistan Telecom Limited (Ufone) in various towns and areas of district Malakand Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Discussing details of the Universal Service Fund (USF), Senator A. Rehman Malik said that the mandate must be revised so that issues of least developed areas may be resolved. Chairman Committee, Senator Rubina Khalid, recommended that if there were certain bylaws pertaining to USF that were proving hurdles to the Ministry, it may consult with the Committee on Delegated Legislations so that these rules may be revisited so as to accommodate and benefit least developed areas.

Regarding lack of services of Pakistan Telecom Limited (Ufone) in various areas of district Malakand, Senator Fida Muhammad informed the Committee that there were three service providers in the area; Ufone, Telenor and Zong with 17 percent, 70 percent and 90 percent coverage respectively. He said that Ufone provided least service in the area and hence this issue must be resolved.

The Ministry explained to the committee that as per license obligations the service providers had fulfilled the license condition. It was also revealed that service providers tend to provide services in commercially viable areas.

Senator A. Rehman Malik was of the view that providing service only to areas that were commercially viable was a human rights violation. He said that even the USF was formed to help service providers expand services to less developed areas. He said that legislation must be formulated to ensure provision of facility to all un-served areas. Chairman Committee, Senator Rubin Khalid directed the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication to provide the Committee with a list of un-served/underserved areas.

The committee was assured that the ministry would look into the matter and review ways in which services could be expanded to various areas of district Malakand.

A. Rehman Malik, Senator Ghous Muhammad Khan Niazi, Senator Tahir Bizenjo Senator Engr Rukhsana Zuberi, Senator Sana Jamali, Senator Fida Muhammad, Senator Mian Muhammad Ateeq Shaikh and senior officers from the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication and Pakistan Telecom Limited attended the meeting.

Published in Daily Times, February 15^th 2019.