LARKANA, June 10: The Pakistan People’s Party, Larkana district, has termed the federal budget for fiscal 2003-04 a jugglery of figures.

In a joint press statement issued on Tuesday, President Larkana PPP Nawab Shabbir Ahmed Chandio, Vice-president Ayaz Soomro, and General Secretary Anwar Bhutto, said the budget was prepared in line with the guidelines of the IMF, where the rich class had got maximum benefits at the cost of poor masses.

Absence of any relief for poor people in the budget showed the real intentions of the government that was hell bent upon constructing Thal canal despite a unanimously adopted resolution of the Sindh Assembly against this project, they said.

Instead of giving any consideration to the provincial assembly’s resolution, the federal government had allocated Rs1 billion for that project, they added. The PPP leaders said it was an open secret that the Thal canal would cast adverse impact on Sindh’s economy.

The federal government was also paying no heed to the provinces’ demand for the constitution of the National Finance Commission, they said.

The PPP office-bearers said the government had so far failed to lift ban on recruitment, it had announced a cut in car duties but did not give any relief to the common man who used public transport.

The district PPP expressed the fear that mini budgets would soon be announced as the government had kept the prices of electricity and petrol out of its control.

DROWN: Two children drowned in a ditch on Tuesday near Kambar town.