KARACHI, May 22: Sindh’s Senior Minister for Finance Syed Sardar Ahmed said on Sunday that all the provinces would get substantial increase in their shares if they accepted the formula proposed by Sindh for the National Finance Commission award.

Talking to journalists at the Governor’s House, the senior minister of Sindh said he had written a letter explaining the formula to the finance ministers of Punjab, the NWFP and Balochistan.

Sardar Ahmed said he had also talked to them on telephone, however, no response in writing had been received so far. He dispelled the impression that the Sindh government had changed its stance of multiple criteria for the distribution of national resources among the provinces and said:” We stand by it. We had suggested population, backwardness and revenue collection to be the basis for the NFC award and we have not withdrawn from it.”

If the other provinces agreed to our formula, Punjab would get Rs160 billion compared to Rs125 billion it had received this year; the NWFP would get Rs45 billion compared to this year’s figure of Rs22 billion and Balochistan would get 50 per cent increase from Rs11 billion to Rs22 billion, Sardar Ahmed said.—PPI