Daily Times

The general discussion on the provincial budget concluded in Punjab Assembly on Monday.

Two ‘demands for grants’ for the fiscal year 2019-20 were also passed.

Finance Minister Makhdoom Hashim Jawan Bakht thanked MPAs for taking part in the budget discussion and for giving suggestions to the government. A total of 100 MPAs, including leader of the opposition Hamza Shehbaz, participated in the budget discussion that continued for five days.

Concluding the general discussion on budget, the finance minister said that the government of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had tried to invest in human resources instead of mega projects. “It is the real change that we promised. Therefore, we introduced the ‘Punjab Ehsas Programme’. Our priority is on education, health, agriculture and industry. Therefore, all this is depicted in our budget,” he said.

“The opposition leader talked about the increasing price of dollar. I just want to ask him one question: what did they do to increase the supply of dollar when the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) was in power?” the finance minister asked. He further added that the PTI government would go for the export-oriented growth, SMEs and entrepreneurship while introducing new laws to increase our exports.

Hashim Jawan Bakht said that the austerity drive initiated by the government was criticised by the opposition without knowing the facts. “The entertainment expenditures of the CM Secretariat were reduced by 60 percent while the expense incurred on the security arrangements of CM were reduced by 66%. An amount of Rs 830 million spend on security was reduced to just Rs 280 million,” the finance minister said.

He was of the view that the government had devised a three-point strategy for the uplift of South Punjab: improvement in human development indicators; administrative strengthening; and legislation. “The government is working tirelessly on all the three fronts. We have allocated Rs 3 billion for South Punjab Secretariat. A total of 35% budget will also be spent on South Punjab as per our regional equalization policy,” he said.

He further added that the work on legislation front was also in progress and South Punjab province would have been crated if the government had a two-third majority in the House.

Later, two demands for grants of education and health with simple majority were passed. The cut motions introduced by the opposition were rejected.

Speaking on the cut motion of health, MPA Malik Ahmed Khan said that the PTI used to criticise the previous government’s health initiatives. “However, nothing has been changed since the PTI came into power. The situation in the health sector has further worsened. We started revamping all the DHQs and THQs, but the PTI government has cancelled the initiative and announced to build eight new hospitals without approving any PC-1,” said Malik Ahmed.

He advised the government not to cause the loss of the people of Punjab due to its personal vendetta. “Therefore, the government should not dump the projects of public welfare,” he said.

Former health minister Khawaja Imran Nazir said that the government had not procured even a single tablet for patients since coming into power. “The medicine being used in public sector hospitals were procured during our tenure. A PTI minister was involved in a scam to increase prices of medicines. However, the government didn’t take any action against him. He went on to say that the minister had made billions of rupees,” he said.

Earlier, the session of Punjab Assembly had started after a delay of more than one and a half hours with Speaker Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi in the chair. The government presented 41 demands for grants while the opposition moved cut motions on five of these grants. The discussion on cut motion will conclude today (Tuesday).