PESHAWAR, Sept 8: The district governments of the NWFP have been provided with 40 per cent of their total salary budgets for the financial year 2002-03, according to official sources.

The provincial finance department has recently released 40 per cent of the total salary budgets of the 24 district governments in line with a decision of the provincial government.

The placement of funds with the district governments, said the sources, would help the newly-formed entities to pay salaries to their staffs during the first four months of the current financial year.

The government’s wage bill for the year 2002-03 has been estimated at over Rs17.91 billion of which over Rs12.290 billion would be paid to the employees of the 24 district governments.

According to the sources, the government has around 274,261 employees working in 37 different departments and various agencies operating across the province.

The education department has the largest work force involving a total of 154,270 employees of different cadres and ranks, making over 56 per cent of the total employees, followed by the police department, which has a total strength of 34,790 employees.

In an effort to make sufficient amount of money available to the newly-formed district governments to take care of their salary bills, around five billion rupees have been placed at their disposal.

Of the Rs12.29 billion total salary budget of the 24 district governments, according to the sources, Abbottabad would get over Rs787 million, Bannu Rs498 million, Battagram Rs239 million, Buner Rs308 million, Charsadda Rs602 million, Chitral Rs368 million, D. I. Khan Rs705 million, Hangu Rs186 million, Haripur Rs572 million, Karak Rs425 million, Kohat Rs468 million, Kohistan Rs256 million, Lakki Marwat Rs387 million, Lower Dir Rs550 million, Malakand Agency Rs 378 million, Mansehra Rs880 million, Mardan Rs875 million Nowshera Rs566 million, Peshawar Rs1,031 million, Shangla Rs262 million, Swabi Rs631 million, Swat Rs784 million, Tank Rs186 million and Upper Dir Rs 345 million.

“Each of the 24 district governments has been released ample funds to meet their monthly salary bill’s requirements for the next four/five months,” said senior government officials.