KP presents supplementary budget of Rs.23.17 billion

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Finance, Taimur Saleem Jhagra Monday presented a supplementary budget of Rs 23.17 billion for the last financial year 2017-18.

Speaking in the provincial assembly, the minister said that the supplementary budget is being presented at a time when all expenditures till June 30 of the financial year 2017-18 are available.

Therefore, he said that irrespective of the previous years, the supplementary budget for financial year 2017-18 instead of differences in revised expenditures is prepared on actual expenditure till June 30, 2018.

The finance minister said that at the presentation of budget 2017-18, the revenue expenditures were estimated at Rs 388 billion, which in revised budget has increased to Rs 389 billion.

However, in some grants, the expenditure in different objects surpassed the estimated allocated amount, due to which the volume of the current expenditure of the supplementary budget has reached to Rs 6.977 billion, whose approval from the House is compulsory.

Highlighting the major causes for presenting supplementary budget, the provincial finance minister said that a huge amount of over Rs 3.92 billion has been released for payment of adhoc relief to the provincial employees, which was mostly adjusted from the savings of different departments.

He said that an additional amount of Rs 1.731 million was released to provincial assembly in head of salaries and allowances while the another amount of Rs 1.39 billion was released to Administration and Justice Department for creation of new vacancies, salaries, allowances, purchase of vehicles, furniture & computer equipment, training, P.O.L, maintenance & repair of building, payment of utilities’ bills and meeting other expenditures of the department.

Similarly, an amount of Rs 817.806 million were released to health department for the purchase of machinery and equipment while PHE Department was paid Rs 401.095 million in head of salaries, allowances, electricity bill, LPR and repairing of machinery and equipment.

Likewise, the Forest and Wildlife Department was released an additional amount of Rs 81.187 million in head of salaries and meeting other requirements while additional fund amount to Rs 507.234 million was released to Irrigation Department for the payment of salaries and allowances, LPR, electricity bills, repairing of irrigation channels and other requirements while Stationery and Printing Department was also released an additional amount of Rs 22.167 million for similar requirements.

Furthermore, he said that in July 2017, a huge additional amount of Rs 3.283 billion released for increase in pension and its payment while Auqaf, Religious, Minorities & Hajj Affairs was released an additional amount of Rs 58.998 million for payment of grants, salaries, allowances and other requirements.

The provincial minister further told that another amount of Rs 6.599 million was released to Energy and Power Department for the payment of salaries and allowances to staff while another amount of Rs 400 million was released for repayment of the federal government debt.

Regarding additional payment in head of annual development programme (ADP) during financial year2017-18, the finance minister said that the total development budget for the year was Rs 126 billion, which after revised expenditures climbed to Rs 134.56 billion that resulted in increasing the developmental budget by Rs 8.56 billion.

However, he said that they are presenting an supplementary development budget of Rs 16.199 billion as the federal government has provided only Rs 3.111 billion for public sector development programme (PSDP) funded schemes while for some schemes, the provincial government released additional funds.