Interior Ministry, ICT and Civil Armed Forces budget raised

ISLAMABAD: The PMLN-led coalition government heightened the budgetary allocations of the Interior Division, the Islamabad Capital Territory and the combined Civil Armed Forces approximately by around 14 percent in the budget for the fiscal year 2022-23.

The Federal Finance Minister Miftah Ismail while announcing the budget in his speech in the National Assembly on Friday announced 20 percent increase under the head of ‘salaries and expenses’ of the Interior Division.

The budgetary allocations for Interior Division salaries and expenses for the year were Rs8.64 billion, which eventually were raised to Rs10.02 billion at the end of the year. For the year 2022-23 the allocations have been raised to Rs12.04 billion.

Under the head of ‘Other expenditure of Interior Division’, there is a slight decrease as compared with the actual expenses occurred in the year 2021-22, which stood at Rs6.96 billion while for the year 2022-23 a total of Rs6.61 billion have been allocated.

However, the current allocations under this head were 5 percent more as compared with the budgetary allocations for the year 2021-22. The Finance minister announced a 13 per cent increase in the budgetary allocations for the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), raising it to Rs13.97 billion under the head of ‘Salaries and other Expenses’ as compared with Rs12.40 billion for the year 2021-22.

The budgetary allocations for the Combined Civil Armed Forces were also raised by 10 percent for the year 2022-23. The total allocations under the head of ‘Salaries and Other Expenses of the ‘Combined Civil Armed Forces’ has been announced to the tune of Rs162.7 billion.

Previously, for the year 2021-22 the allocations were made to the tune of Rs136.8 billion while the revised estimate for the year 2021-22 stood at Rs148.23 billion. For the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) the government as allocated Rs268.9 billion in the budget for the year 2022-23.