RAWALPINDI, May 23: Rawalpindi district has so far received 73 per cent of the annual development grant with barely a month left in the end of the current fiscal year, official sources said here on Friday.

District Nazim Raja Tariq Kiyani said the delayed release of funds to the district government had affected the pace of the development projects.

Sources said the determination of funds for a particular district by the Provincial Finance Commission (PFC) caused the inordinate delay. The commission, they said, had to make allocations for 34 districts of the province on the basis of their population that took a lot of time.

Secondly, they said, the commission met once or twice a month and during each meeting it had a very heavy agenda due to which several items were left unattended.

They suggested that instead of releasing funds on monthly basis, the commission should do so in shape of six months instalments that would also ease pressure on the district governments.

Moreover, they said, the procedure in vogue for disbursement of the funds was time-consuming. The release is first intimated to the State Bank of Pakistan, Karachi, which then notifies it to its district branches.

The officials said Rawalpindi district had so far received Rs207 million as development grant out of which Rs174 million had been released to the executing agencies.

Giving the details of the releases made to the executing agencies, they said Rs34.177 million had been provided for electrification; Rs5.525 million for water supply projects; Rs2.692 million for Sui gas; Rs14.824 million for buildings and Rs45.653 million for road construction.

Another Rs33.204 million are lying with the district government’s finance department awaiting disbursement to executing agencies.

Meanwhile, District Nazim Raja Tariq Kiyani while talking to a delegation said the district government was constructing buildings for 47 shelterless schools and 150 km-long farm to market roads with the help of the development budget.

He said the district government was specially focussing on the quality of work and timely completion of the projects.