Sindh CM pledges to provide facilities to Qalandar’s devotees

SUKKUR: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has said the government is trying to provide the maximum facilities to the devotees of Hazrat Lal Shahbaz Qalandar (RA) who come to celebrate his three-day annual Urs at Sehwan from various parts of the country.

While talking to the media persons after visiting the Mazar on the concluding day, the Sindh chief minister responded to the statement of Sindh Governor Imran Ismail and said that after releasing monthly salaries to the government employees, financial position of the province becomes vulnerable, while the governor does not know about the financial matters. He criticised the federal government and termed that it fails in tax collection and its wrong policies cause financial problems to the provinces.

Replying to a question regarding the presidential system, Murad Ali Shah said it is just a rumour, even President Dr Arif Alvi also ruled out any possibility of presidential system. He further added that the Chairman PPP Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and the people of Pakistan support democratic system except some who are trying to hatch conspiracies to derail the democratic system for their personal gains.

Regarding development, the chief minister said due to unavailability of funds, the Sindh government is unable to launch any new development work not only in Sehwan but other parts of the province too. He added that the provincial government is trying to utilise the available funds to complete the ongoing schemes.

Shah said other provinces do not talk about their financial grievances for different reasons but Sindh always dares to raise the voice for the rights of the people. He said whenever the Sindh government raises its voice for the due share of NFC Award, the federal government starts questioning about the performance.

The chief minister said Sindh has received Rs.120 billion less from its share in the NFC Award and also received Rs.11 billion less for federal government schemes as Rs15 billion were announced. He said due to shortage of funds, the development schemes were affected and he would raise the issue in detail on the floor of the House.

To a question, Murad Ali Shah informed that last year Rs.204 billion were spent on the development work and it was the first time that more than Rs.200 billion were spent on development schemes. He informed that Rs.75 to 80 billion had been spent on development in the current year, added that he was not even anticipating that Rs100 billion would be spent on development.

The Sindh chief minister asked the people who said the provincial government is not capable of utilising funds appropriately, then how Rs.204 billion were spent on development schemes during the last year. He said he wishes that the federal government should rectify its direction and present a people welfare budget.

Talking about the NRO for the PPP leadership, Murad Ali Shah they don’t need NRO and the federal government should do whatever it wants to do but should think about the people.

The chief minister said that there are few reasons of not procuring wheat as the last year’s stock of wheat is still available. He said every year subsidy is given for the procurement of wheat but this year the government due to shortage of funds could not give subsidy.

To another question, he said Sindh is the only province, where multinational organizations like the World Bank are working and different projects are going on.

He said that the salaries of Sindh Police are higher than the police of other provinces. While talking about the abusive language of Prime Minister Imran Khan against PPP leadership, he said the PM did not learn the art of apologising and added that he does not think the federal government would last long.