LAHORE: The Punjab cabinet on Friday abolished subsidy as well as rebate on export of sugar in a bid to stabilise sugar prices in the province.

The cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Usman Buzdar also decided to give two kilo sugar per individual consumer in Ramazan bazaars across the province. The Ramazan bazaars will be converted into Eid bazaars from 21st of Ramazan. For Eid bazaars, the Punjab government has provided a subsidy of Rs20 million.

In the light of the directions of the Supreme Court, the cabinet meeting approved fixing levy of Re1 per litre as aquifer tariff (water charges) on water bottling and beverage companies extracting groundwater. Wasa, local government and the irrigation department will issue notifications in this regard.

The cabinet decided opening a separate account for the money collected under this head besides devising a comprehensive mechanism for receiving and utilisation of water charges.

Approves levy of Re1 per litre on water bottling

The cabinet meeting approved extending jurisdiction of the Fort Munro Development Authority to include whole Tribal Area of Dera Ghazi Khan and renaming it as “Koh-i-Suleman Development Authority”.

The School Education Department apprised the cabinet members of amendments to the transfer policy of teachers. A detailed briefing will also be given to the parliamentary party about the e-Transfer Policy 2013.

The cabinet decided amending the LDA laws with regard to utilisation of land for marquees, marriage and banquet halls. The meeting expressed its satisfaction over the achievement of wheat procurement target.

The cabinet also discussed audit reports of C&W, housing and urban development and public health engineering, irrigation, LG&CD departments and Infrastructure Development Authority Punjab for the audit year 2018-19; reports on biannual monitoring on the implementation of seventh National Finance Commission Award for the periods from July to December 2016, January to June 2017 and July to December 2017; regularisation of support staff of the Punjab Revenue Authority; resource mobilisation proposals for financial year 2019-20; and appointment of the Punjab Pension Fund general manager.

Published in Dawn, May 25th, 2019