24 May 2004	Monday	04 Rabi-us-Saani 1425

KARACHI, May 23: The National Finance Commission Award be formulated on justifiable grounds to ensure that smaller provinces, particularly Sindh, get their legitimate share in the resources of the country.

This was demanded by the convener of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Dr Imran Farooq, in a press statement released to Dawn on Sunday. The statement said Sindh contributed more than 70 per cent to the country's resources, yet it was not given its due share. The spirit of justice and fair-play demanded that the province be provided more.

If Sindh was given its due share, said the statement, the other provinces would also try to contribute more to the national exchequer. Once again population was being treated as the sole basis for the division of resources.

Doing so not only represented discrimination against the smaller provinces but also ensured that the bigger province did not strive for generating more funds, said the statement.

Dr Imran Farooq stressed the need to adopt the formula for the sharing of resources under which the areas which generated more funds were given more share. This kind of formula was adopted in many countries of the world, added Dr Farooq.

The people of Sindh would not accept an unjustifiable division of resources. Dr Farooq also appealed to the government of the North-West Frontier Province to join the other smaller provinces on this contentious issue.

The induction of 2.5 per cent sales tax, by eroding the octroi tax, must be extracted out of the divisible pool. It should be distributed instead on the 1998 collection of octroi tax, which means that the amount of octroi tax collected by each province in 1998 must be treated as the basis of its share in sales tax.