KARACHI: The provincial government on Saturday presented in the Sindh Assembly what it called tax-free but deficit budget for financial year 2016-17 with a total outlay of Rs 869.1 billion, a rise of around 15 per cent as compared to fiscal year 2015-16. Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah presented the budget during the Sindh Assembly session following its approval by members of the provincial cabinet. Speaking in the assembly, the minister said the Annual Development Programme (ADP) for the coming financial year would be Rs 225 billion, an 39% increase over the current year’s. He said that another key feature of the budget was significant increase in allocations for some of the smaller departments, which perform important social welfare functions but generally get smaller share in the resource allocation, like Social Welfare, Special Education, Sports and Youth Affairs, Women Development and Minorities Affairs. The budget for Social Welfare department was being increased by 65.5%, with the additional amount to be spent on improvement of facilities like Dar-ul-Amans and Dar-ul-Atfals, etc. The overall budget for Special Education Department was increased by 35%, but the non-salary budget has surged by 433% and this additional amount would be spent on improving the 50 facilities meant for special children across the province. The budget for the Sports and Youth Affairs department was increased by 46%. The budget for the Women Development department was increased by 149%, most of which will be spent to provide microfinance facilities to women entrepreneurs and also to provide legal aid services to needy women. The grant for minorities was increased from Rs 100 million to Rs 300 million, an increase of a massive 200%. The minister said the Sindh Government’s tax administration was performing well and hoped that the current year’s target of Rs 124 billion would be achieved. He said the Excise and Taxation department also succeeded in achieving the target. Considering this excellent performance, the minister said the Sindh Government had set more challenging targets for these two entities in next financial year. Our overall tax collection was estimated at Rs 154 billion for fiscal year 2016-17, which was 24% higher than the current year’s target. The minister said there were no new taxes in the budget for the next financial year. “In fact we are reducing the rate of sales tax on service from the current 14% to 13%. We have rationalized certain taxes.” He said the SRB was being assigned a task to collect Rs 78 billion which would be 28% higher than the current years’ collection. It was an ambitious but achievable goal.