Rs1,100 bn allocated for defence

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has proposed Rs1,100 billion allocation for defence budget for the financial year 2018-2019, showing an increase of little over 10 percent from the revised estimates of Rs998 billion for the year 2017-2018 to cater to needs of the armed forces and other defence-related establishments. The proposed defence budget is about 26 percent of the total estimated current expenditure of Rs4,178 billion for next fiscal.

The Pakistan Army would get major chunk of Rs523 billion from the defence budget. The major part of it, which is Rs295.5 billion, would go to employees-related expenses and Rs82 billion would be used for operating expenditure.

The Pakistan Air Force would receive Rs233.7 billion against the previous budget’s revised estimates of Rs201 billion with Rs50.7 billion going to employees related expenses, Rs121 billion for physical assets and Rs28.6 billion for operating expenses. The Pakistan Navy’s budget has been kept at Rs119.3 billion against the last budget’s revised estimates of Rs190.3 billion. Out of it, Rs32` billion would be spent on employees and Rs55.3 billion for physical assets. An amount of Rs223.9 has been proposed for defence production establishments, ISOs and accounts organs.

Pakistan’s defence budget, which is around 9.25 billion in terms of US dollars, is nearly seven times less than defence budget of India. The Indian government had announced 63 billion dollars defence budget for the fiscal year 2018-19.