Utilisation is made against released funds, says Fata Secretariat

PESHAWAR: The Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) Secretariat in a rejoinder to the news item that appeared in The News on Wednesday said that 394 out of 444 un-approved schemes are new.

It said 274 schemes have been approved during the first half of the current financial year.

The FATA Secretariat’s press release on Thursday said selection and identification of the sites is a time-consuming exercise.

It explained that the preparation of PC-I, detailed cost estimates, designing, etc of the 17 unapproved schemes are under active consideration at the respective levels and most will be approved before the closing of the current financial year.

It said the approval progress in the half of the current financial year is more than 60 percent and the remaining unapproved schemes will be approved accordingly.

The statement said that in case of quarterly releases by the federal government against the block allocation of Fata to the tune of Rs.24010 million (local component), Rs4.802 billion were released in the 1st quarter whereas Rs4 billion were released in 2nd quarter against the demand of Rs 4.802 billion, withholding Rs.802 million.

It added that in case of the 3rd quarter the demand of Rs7.203 billion was submitted on January 19.

The press release noted that the federal government released Rs3.150 billion only on March 12 and withheld Rs2852.5 million. The total withheld amount by the federal government against the share of three quarters amounted to Rs3654.50 million.

The Fata Secretariat said it is pursuing the case with the federal government to release the withheld amount.

The release said that a letter was sent to Finance Division on March 16 for early releases of the balance of the withheld amount in the larger interest of the public.

Additionally, it said a meeting in this respect was held on February 21 between the Joint Chief Economist, PD&R Division, Islamabad, representative of Finance Division, and Additional Secretary P&D Fata.

“It is to clarify that utilization are made against the released funds in hand and not the one budgeted in the PSDP, which is Rs.24.500 billion for the whole year against which only Rs11.952 billion have been released,” the press release said.

“Despite all the obvious hindrances including law and order situation, harsh weather, difficulty in mobility due to remote and hard terrain, etc experienced in the past, Fata administration always utilized 100 percent released funds, before closing of the each financial year,” the press release said.