RAWALPINDI: The City District Government Rawalpindi (CDGR) on Thursday approved its annual budget worth Rs10.036 billion for the financial year 2014-15 with Rs275 million allocated for development projects.
The budget was approved by District Development Committee led by District Coordination Officer (DCO) Sajid Zafar Dall at a meeting attended by the executive district officers (EDOs) finance and planning and works and services.
More than 90 per cent of the funds will be utilised for the salaries of the 30,822 employees of the CDGR. A major chunk of the budget will go to salaries account of the education department and 28 per cent will be received by other departments.
The Punjab government allocated Rs10.067 billion for the district under the Provincial Finance Commission Award.
The city district government received Rs293 million which will be handed over to the Rawalpindi Waste Management Company for the sanitation services.
The total outlay of the budget is Rs10.036 billion. A sum of Rs9.214 million would be spent on the salaries and remaining will be used to pay utility bills.
The CDGR managed to earn Rs166 million from two main sources of income - commercialisation fee and tax on billboards and the Pirwadhai general bus stand.
The CDGR allocated Rs2819.310 million for the education sector and Rs855.823 million for the health sector.
However, these funds will be spent on the payment of salaries and other expenditures, not on the establishment of any new educational institution and health facilities.
This year, the Punjab government had imposed a ban on the utilisation of maintenance and repair funds by the government departments without the approval of the district coordination officers.
Last year, Rs40 million had been allocated for the maintenance and repair works, which were spent on the maintenance of residences of senior officials.
However, applications submitted by officials in the Basic Pay Scale (BPS) 1 to 4 remained unattended.
The CDGR will provide an additional amount of Rs70 million to the health department for the provision of free medicines in the basic health units and hospitals. Last year, the health department had received Rs40 million for this purpose.
When contacted, the district officer budget, Israr Ahmed, said that the salaries of all the employees had been increased by 10 per cent as promised by the provincial government.
In reply to a question about the ban on maintenance and repair works, he said the provincial government had directed to adopt austerity measures and the directives had been passed on to all the departments.
He said fuel charges and office expenditures would be curtailed during the current fiscal year.
Published in Dawn, July 25th , 2014
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