HYDERABAD, May 10: Sindh People’s Party Parliamentarians president Nisar Ahmad Khuhro has demanded reconstitution of the National Finance Commission and share of Sindh in the NFC Award on the basis of its revenue contribution.

Talking to newsmen at the engagement ceremony of the daughter of Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal’s MPA Abdul Rehman Rajput on Friday night, he said Sindh had suffered a loss of Rs56 billion during the last seven years owing to the present NFC formula, based on population.

He condemned the decision to continue the old NFC formula, saying it was an insult to Sindh Assembly members who had adopted a unanimous resolution, calling for reconstitution of the NFC.

He said the provinces should be permitted to recover the general sales tax and utilize it for the betterment of their people if the government was not ready to change the NFC formula. The Centre should put forward its financial requirements in the head of salaries and the provinces should contribute after meeting their own expenditures, he proposed.

The PPP leader reminded that the present NFC Award was signed in 1996 by caretaker Sindh Chief Minister Mumtaz Ali Bhutto. President Gen Pervez Musharraf had earlier extended the same NFC Award and now the civilian government also continued it, causing a loss of Rs8 billion to Sindh, he regretted.

He said needs of the provinces and their revenue contribution should be taken into account before deciding their share.

About the greater Thal canal project, Mr Khuhro said it was on the record that Sindh Minister Sadruddin Shah had stated on the assembly floor that only 0.3 per cent of the total cost had been spent on the project. That was why he had been calling for stopping construction of the project as the work was in its initial stages, he added.

However, he said, the Water and Power Development Authority continued with the project’s construction and Sindh Chief Minister Ali Mohammad Mahar also gave a conflicting statement that the project could not be shelved as 50 per cent work had already been completed.

The leader of opposition in the Sindh Assembly criticized the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, which had jointly moved resolutions on the Thal canal and the NFC Award, for maintaining a silence over the province’s issues.

Referring to discharge of 10 million acre feet water at Kotri downstream, he said instead of taking up the matter with the authorities concerned, the Sindh government agreed to share surplus water with Punjab.

He said the shortage of water at Kotri downstream had affected the agriculture sector of Sindh.