KARACHI, Aug 26: One positive outcome of the breakup on Monday of the ruling coalition government at the federal level is the beginning of a race between PML(N) and the PPP to quickly deliver the social welfare programmes in their respective jurisdictions to the benefit of poor people.

In Islamabad, the PPP-led federal government has already put in place a system to deliver Rs1,000 a month to poorest of the poor in all 106 districts and nearly 6,000 union councils of the country under Benazir Income Support Programme.

A steering committee headed by federal finance minister with a few other federal ministers and secretaries and well-known economist Dr Kaiser Bengali as its administrator is expected to start delivering the monthly stipend to the poor during Ramazan.

Under this programme, the government will distribute over Rs40 billion in the current fiscal year to some 3.7 million households. Eventually, the number of households will increase to seven million. “This is one of the biggest-ever social welfare programme for poorest of the poor in the region,’’ a well-placed source in Islamabad remarked.

Not to be left behind in the race is the PML(N), which inherited a programme from PML(Q) launched late last year to deliver Zakat fund. Chaudhry Pervez Elahi’s programme was taken up in an indecent haste with an eye on coming election.

The current programme—Food Stamp Programme—is said to have been drawn with a little more care and attention. While Chaudhry’s programme did not prove effective and failed to give the desired results as is amply evident from the February 2008 elections outcome, the PML(N) sources in Karachi said that Mian Shahbaz Sharif is an immaculate manager, who is himself action-oriented and is a hard task master.

Many PML(N) activists in Karachi are confident that a large number of poor in Punjab will benefit from the Food Stamp Programme by getting wheat flour and other grains at subsidised rates. The PML(N) government is taking up implementation of the provincial ADP on a fast track, which, too, is expected to generate employment and deliver services to the people living in rural areas.

Taking a cue, the PPP Government in Sindh is beginning from next week the training of 40,000 young men and women under Benazir Youth Development Programme. Under this scheme the Sindh government is offering more than 50 trades to young people with a monthly stipend that commensurate with the academic qualification of the trainee.

A post-graduate will be offered Rs7,000 a month for the period of training, a graduate Rs6,000 a month, an undergraduate Rs5,000 a month, matriculate and intermediate Rs4,000 a month and under-matriculate Rs3,000 a month. The government is taking steps to help trainees in getting their jobs or support them in self-employment.

In the current fiscal year, the government intends to offer such facilities to about 100,000 unemployed persons, which will be increased next year. Under other programmes, the government is set to offer about 25,000 acres of irrigated land in Larkana, Thatta, Khairpur, Jacobabad and Badin to 3,459 landless farmers before mid of September.

Each landless farmer, preferably a lady, will be given eight acres of irrigated land with an input package. Applications for allotment of such lands have been invited through Mukhtarkars in various tehsils. The selection of poor and landless will be made by Population Rural Support Programme, which has already drawn up poverty profile of a few districts in Sindh.

Officials in the Sindh government are confident that new allottees of these lands will start farming from next Rabi.

In addition, programmes are being put into operation to bring more than half a million households under health insurance cover on a yearly policy of Rs250 for each household. The Sindh government will provide premium of the policy for which a top private insurance company has already been engaged.

“Unless the coalition break-up does not cause bickering and acrimony, but initiate a healthy and competitive service and delivery programmes by the PPP and PML(N), the people at large will see it with appreciation,’’ remarked a local political activist.