LAHORE, June 9: The Punjab government has set aside a record Rs250 billion for the Annual Development Plan (ADP) for the 2012-13 year, which is 51 per cent more than the outgoing year’s revised ADP estimates of Rs165 billion.

The original estimate for the previous year was Rs220 billion.

Formulated within the Medium Term Development Framework (MTDF), it has “equitable growth embracing all classes/sectors, generate employment, encourage public-private investment, infrastructure development and rehabilitation” as its main objectives. The programme will be financed by the province’s own resources (Rs208 billion) and foreign assistance (Rs11 billion) while there will be Rs30 billion operational shortfall, according to the budget documents presented before the Punjab Assembly on Saturday.

A sum of Rs86.7 billion has been allocated for the social sector with major focus on health (Rs25 billion).

An amount of Rs14 billion has been earmarked for women empowerment initiatives and Rs11 billion for rapid bus transit system in the provincial metropolis.

A huge sum of Rs28.8 billion has been appropriated for devolved planning. Under it Rs10.5 billion will go for South Punjab Development Programme and Rs17.4 billion for district development packages, and Rs5 billion for accelerated district development package.

Under the special initiative, Rs12 billion more will be given to tehsil municipal administrations (TMAs) and Rs4 billion for equalisation grant for district development.

Another major appropriation has been made for infrastructure development (Rs62.9 billion) with Rs33 billion for roads, over Rs11 billion for irrigation, Rs5.3 billion for urban development and Rs10 billion for investment in the energy sector to overcome power shortage in the province.

As far as production sectors are concerned, an allocation of Rs8.615 billion has been made for the purpose.

A major chunk of it (Rs5.04 billion) will go to the agriculture sector and Rs1.65 billion to livestock.

A sum of Rs4 billion will go to the chief minister’s laptop scheme for students and Rs2 billion for green tractor scheme for rural youth.

An allocation of one billion rupees has been made for solar tube-wells/renewable energy and as much amount for solar panels.

Provision of one billion rupees has been made for purchase of buses for women colleges.

In the outgoing year, the ADP size was Rs220 billion. However, the allocations remained under utilised because the revised estimates were Rs165 billion.

The areas that faced cuts were general economic, commercial and labour affairs (from Rs92 billion down to Rs41 billion), construction and transport (from Rs87 billion to Rs51.7 billion), hospital services (from Rs16.5 billion to Rs11.7 billion), and education affairs and services (from Rs28.9 billion to Rs21.6 billion).