KARACHI: Sindh Finance Minister Murad Ali Shah said on Sunday that the allocation of Rs225 billion in the head of the annual development programme in the provincial budget 2016-17 was a record and the government would release funds from July so that local bodies could implement the projects.

Speaking at a post-budget press conference here, the minister, however, defended the non-utilisation of the last financial year’s ADP resources and said that the Supreme Court had imposed a ban on initiating of any new project because of the local government elections.

He said that another reason was the National Accountability Bureau, whose officials had arrested the chief engineer and superintendent engineer of the irrigation department on a fake complaint and kept them under 90-day detention.

“We have stopped payment of Rs6 billion of the irrigation department and in the coming monsoon floods could come in Sindh. If flood causes any loss the NAB officials would be held responsible for creating a fear among the officials,” he added.

Another reason for not full utilisation of the development funds was capacity building and capability and the government was paying attention to it, he conceded.

He again lodged his protest over an undue delay in the new National Finance Commission Award saying that the federal government was not discharging its constitutional obligation. “Either the [federal] government has failed to attain its target of taxes or want to push the provincial governments to face difficulties.”

The finance minister said that the focus of the new fiscal budget was the overall betterment and welfare of the people through effective financial management for direct impact on service delivery.

He recalled the allocation priorities in the budget 2016-17 with particular reference to education, health, law and order and energy.

Referring to the increase in the volume of the sales tax from Rs61bn to Rs 78bn in the next year, Mr Shah said that the target was increased in a planned manner and not in haste.

He said efforts would be made to improve collection of agri-income tax by rationalisation of its tax rate in consultation with other stakeholders.

He said that the government paid more attention to the education department during the current fiscal year and the results were encouraging.

In reply to a question, he said that in order to improve the performance of government schools “we are opting public-private partnership and for this purpose Rs1 billion has been allocated”.

Likewise, in the health sector attention was paid on ensuring availability of medicines in public hospitals and for this purpose more funds had been allocated for procurement of medicine, he added.

About energy sector, he said that the government had allocated Rs70bn for infrastructure development in Thar without any assistance from the federal government.

He said that the Sindh government had installed 100MW power plants in Jamshoro and an agreement was signed with Hesco for purchase of electricity but the company declined the offer and said that they had enough power.

He asked if they had enough energy then why there was loadshedding in Sindh.

Now the K-Electric had agreed to purchase the 100MW for which transmission lines were being laid by the Sindh government, he said, adding that this 100MW would be available to Karachi from August.

Mr Shah said that the acceptance letter to start work on K-4 water supply project had been issued and the project would be completed within two years.

The Sindh government had allocated Rs6bn and it expected that the federal government would also contribute its equal share so that the first phase of the long-delayed project could be completed in one year, he added.

Excise Minister Gayanchand Esrani, Information Adviser to the chief minister Maula Bux Chandio, Finance Secretary Sohail Rajput and Additional Chief Secretary Muhammad Waseem were also present.

Published in Dawn, June 13th, 2016