KARACHI: As the Sindh Assembly started a general discussion on the provincial budget for financial year 2016-17 on Tuesday, parliamentary party leader of the opposition Muttahida Qaumi Movement Syed Sardar Ahmed stressed the need for creating more provinces in the country and asked the rulers to at least empower the districts and local government institutions.

Tuesday was the first day of the general discussion on the budget in which, besides Mr Ahmed, four other lawmakers — two belonging to the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party and one each from the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional and MQM — also participated.

While taking the floor, Mr Ahmed said that there was a dire need for creating new provinces for improving governance and administrative affairs in the country.

Giving the example of India, which had eight provinces at the time of Partition but now it had 27 provinces, the octogenarian politician regretted that in Pakistan some people became angry whenever the need for more administrative units was highlighted.

He added that if creation of new provinces was not possible then at least districts be fully empowered so that the people could develop their cities by effective utilisation of resources.

He said that on the pattern of the National Finance Commission, a provincial finance commission be set up which could distribute funds to the 29 districts of the province.

Recalling his pre-budget meeting with Finance Minister Murad Ali Shah, he said that his party had asked the government not to overburden the people with taxes by imposing new ones or upward revising the rate of existing taxes. But the budget documents did not show that the provincial government had paid any attention to our suggestions, he added.

Analysing the ratio of direct and indirect taxes, he said that 93 per cent of the taxes were indirect while only 7pc were direct taxes. Besides, 85pc tax was being paid by the urban population of Sindh and as such the burden of taxes should not only be on urban areas.

“We have lot of resources to meet our financial needs. Therefore, instead of increasing taxes, its rates be reduced...the rate on tax on services is too much and it should be reduced to 10 per cent,” he suggested.

He also expressed concern over the Rs200 billion spending on the salaries and pensions and asked the government to explain as to why they announced 50,000 new jobs in the budget.

About the hefty allocation for law and order, he asked how long the government would rely on Rangers and the Army for maintenance of law and order.

He urged the government to bring police reforms so that they could meet the expectations.

He also called to change the agri-income tax system and bring income from crops like wheat, cotton and sugar cane under the tax net. This could fetch an additional Rs2bn in revenue, he added.

PML-F lawmaker Saeed Khan Nizamani said that there was no relief for the people of Sindh in the budget, which had a huge outlay of Rs869bn.

Mehmood Razzaq of the MQM said that the development budget for the current fiscal year could not be fully utilised, as only 46pc of the total funds were consumed. “What we could expect in the coming year.”

He said that tall claims had been made about a hefty allocation for development of Karachi, but several development projects could not be completed in the city since long.

PPP’s Sharmila Faruqui said that it was a balanced budget in which no new taxes had been imposed, while allocations for education, health and law and order had been increased.

She said that Rs10bn had been allocation for Karachi’s mega projects.

She said that the government was being criticised for ignoring welfare and development of the people in rural areas, but it was a fact that people living in the rural areas had a realisation of delivery of services to them, which had manifested from the results of the recent local government elections in which people had once again reposed confidence on the PPP.

Slamming the federal government, she said that it ignored Sindh in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor projects, while the new National Finance Commission Award was not announced and Rs112bn was still outstanding against federation.

Another PPP lawmaker, Dr Sohrab Sarki, said that the Sindh budget was a continuation of the vision of the PPP leadership and tradition of service to the people.

In the budget, enough allocation had been made for development of each part, district and taluka of Sindh. “Every division has been given development fund.”

He said: “Karachi is our city for which enough fund has been allocated for its development projects and more ought to be allocated as we would jointly work along with all [stakeholders], including the MQM.”

After Dr Sarki’s speech, the house was adjourned at 3pm by the chair to reassemble on Wednesday.

Earlier, Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani administered oath to two newly returned MPAs of the MQM — Mehfoozyar Khan and Syed Qamar Abbas Rizvi.

The house also observed a one-minute silence for the victims of the Orlando terrorism attack.

The house also prayed for the early recovery of eminent social worker Abdul Sattar Edhi.

Before the start of the general discussion, PPP woman lawmaker Shamim Mumtaz drew attention of the chair towards an unpleasant incident in which Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf activists used smear words against her.

The lawmakers condemned the incident and Samar Ali Khan, the parliamentary party head of the PTI, extended an apology to the PPP lawmaker and pledged to take up this issue before his high command.

Published in Dawn, June 15th, 2016

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