March 10, 2006	Friday	Safar 9, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, March 9: Federal Minister for Population Welfare Chaudhry Shahbaz Hussain has said that the government has increased the budgetary allocation for the Population Welfare Programme (PWP) in the Northern Areas form Rs 6.662 million to Rs 67 million.

In an official statement issued here on Wednesday, the minister said that the government attached high priority to the uplift of reproductive health and social welfare of Gilgit- Baltistan.

The purpose of this 10 per cent increase in allocation was to put the programme in the NAs economically on strong footing in order to make it function efficiently.

For its smooth functioning, he said, the government had decentralised the programme in the region by creating 163 posts in different cadres. The aim of decentralisation was to enable the area to fully participate in the national population welfare programme.

He said the government was making every possible effort to bring down population growth in the NAs. For this purpose the government had set up 32 family welfare centres and three mobile service units.

The scheme of male mobilisers had also been initiated for creating awareness among the people of the area regarding the benefit of family planning.

FAMILY PLANNING: The ministry of population would take the help of community and opinion leaders including religious scholars to check the country’s population growth.

This was stated by Federal Minister for Population, Ch Shahbaz Hussain, in a meeting with female Ulema and scholars of Rawalpindi and Islamabad here on Thursday.

The role of opinion makers in spreading awareness about family planning was vital in every society and Pakistan could not ignore this reality.

He said religious leaders and community leaders played major roles in opinion formation of the community, and the government would take the help of these people in implementing its family planning plans.

He said the country would never put to practice any plan that contradicted Islamic teachings and Shariah. He said the ministry was fully aware of the norms and traditions of Pakistani society and would implement plans for population control that did not clash with these norms. Islam, he said, had put emphasis on planning in life including family.

Pakistan, he said, could follow the examples of Malaysia and Indonesia in population control strategies. Both the countries had successfully reduced their population.

He said it was the duty of the government to work for the welfare of its people and the ministry of population was just moving in this direction by controlling the population growth.

He said the government could provide basic amenities to its people provided the population was controlled.

Basic health and education facilities could only be provided to a well-planned population, he observed.