‘Budget no less than a drone attack on the poor’

LAHORE

All the Opposition parties of Punjab Assembly staged a protest outside PA against the provincial budget for the year 2016-17 while terming it anti-poor and lacking any vision.

The Opposition parties of PA, including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, Pakistan People's Party and Pakistan Muslim League-Q and Jamaat-e-Islami led by Opposition leader Mian Mehmood-ur-Rasheed gathered on the Punjab Assembly stairs after the budget speech and chanted slogans against the government for 'misleading' the nation. The Opposition members also slammed the Punjab government for presenting a budget which merely suited the interests of rulers and came up with no relief for poor population of Punjab.

Mian Mehmood-ur-Rasheed, the Opposition leader, while talking to media outside PA stated that budget was another example of the Punjab government’s anti-poor stance and it was obvious that the PML-N leadership had no interest to address the public grievances. He said despite all efforts by Opposition, the Punjab government had once again shifted the major chunk of budget towards projects like orange train, underpasses, metro buses but hadn’t paid any heed to improve human development.

He said that the wealth gap in Punjab was widening with every passing day but rulers were paying no attention to facilitate the poor. He stated the much trumpeted Kissan Package had miserably failed to address the grievances of farmers and government lacked any vision to strengthen the backbone of country's economy.

The Opposition leader also stated that it was regretful that amount allocated in the previous budget hadn’t been spent so far on the announced schemes.

Dr Waseem Akhter, the parliamentary leader of Jamaat-e-Islami on the occasion stated it wasn’t the budget of Punjab, but a budget of ‘Sharif family.’ He said the people of Punjab were forced to commit suicide due to their poor economic state but the government wasn’t taking measures to protect them.

Qazi Ahmed Saeed, the PPP Parliamentary leader on the occasion also expressed disappointment over the budget and stated the anti-farmer policies of the Punjab government continued like past.

Later, talking to The News, Saadia Sohail, the PTI MPA stated that the Punjab budget was nothing less than a drone attack on poor population of the province. She stated that the government had massively violated merit and justice in the province as poor and elite were paying same amount of taxes but there was a huge difference between the level of facilities enjoyed by both.

She stated all claims by the PML-N government to improve the health sector seemed a far cry as the hospitals were in miserable condition but the government was only busy in ‘self-projection’ while playing politics over projects like orange train and metro buses. She stated the government hadn’t paid any attention to cater the needs of patients while upgrading hospitals, overcoming bed and medicine shortage, improving the service structure of doctors, addressing the complaints of the paramedical staff.

Moreover, she said the situation in every sector whether it was health, education, human development, law and order was worsening with every passing day.

Saadia Sohail went on to say that budget for the year 2016-17 was nothing less than a drone attack on the poor population of Punjab which was being treated brutally by the government. Ali Salman Siddique, the MPA elected independently from Nankana and a member of Opposition benches said there was no good news for the poor in the current budget as it carried no direct, no strategic plan to address real issues like education, health, water supply and sanitation.