Punjab presents Rs85.6b budget

LAHORE: The Punjab government Monday tabled Rs1,900.6 billion revised expenditures for the ongoing fiscal year 2017-18, along with supplementary budget of Rs85.6 billion, forging its constitutional right of presenting full fiscal year or a quarter of a next fiscal year budget.

The objective of presenting a supplementary budget is to give complete opportunity to the next elected government to make the budget according to its priorities. The budget documents available with The News showed that the total size of the supplementary budget is Rs85.6 billion, out of which Rs21.950 billion would be spent on the development side and Rs61.56 billion on non-development expenditures.

The supplementary expenditures of total budgetary estimates stood at 4.3 per cent for the fiscal year 2017-18 as compared to the last fiscal year of 9 per cent of 2016-17. Punjab Finance Minister Dr Aysha Pasha, in her speech in the Punjab Assembly, stated that Punjab’s per capita growth was highest compared with other provinces, while the provincial revenue collection had increased by 345 per cent since 2008, which helped improve availability of civic facilities in the province.

Besides, the Punjab government supported all other provincial governments in different aspects and Nawaz Sharif Kidney Hospital Sawat was one of such examples of the support. The Punjab government, despite having all constitutional rights, given to it under Article 125 and 126 of the Constitution, did not present budget for the next fiscal year to give respect to the public mandate of the provincial government to be given to it through vote in the upcoming general election.

“We have given the right to the next elected government to use the provincial exchequer and allocate the resources in accordance with its priorities. Therefore, we are tabling only supplementary budget for the ongoing fiscal year 2017-18,” the minister said.

According to the budget documents, the government would spend the highest supplementary budget on education sector amounting to Rs19.863 billion, followed by roads and bridges 19.104 billion and health services Rs17.162 billion. This explains the priority areas of the government during the ongoing fiscal year 2017-18.