KARACHI: The highlight of the day during over 10-hour-long post-budget debate in the Sindh Assembly on Friday was confrontation and extension of an olive branch as the members on the two sides of the aisle clashed verbally over the budget allocations in urban and rural areas in the province.

The controversy was ostensibly triggered when opposition members belonging to the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and lone member of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) opted for a harsh tone against the provincial government for neglecting urban parts of the province in the budget, provoking the treasury benches to reply in the same coin.

However, every speaker called for a consensus and joint efforts to face the challenges.

In his hard-hitting speech, MQM-P’s Jawed Hanif said that the provincial government had recruited over 350,000 people during its term, but people belonging to urban areas were neglected.

Sharjeel says PPP wants to end politics of hatred

He said that the provincial government had increased the salaries of the provincial government employees, who numbered between six million and seven million, but nothing was done for the rest of the population to survive in inflationary economic condition.

He said that subsidies and support prices were given to the landlords in rural areas, while people in urban areas were becoming poorer.

Reacting sharply to Mr Hanif’s speech, Information Minister Sharjeel Inam Memon said that the PPP leadership wanted all people to go together for the uplift of the province, but it was necessary to respond if someone spoke hatefully.

He said that poor farmers had 50 per cent share in subsidies and support prices of wheat and sugar cane. “Agriculture in the province is the only trade where employee and employer get equal share of the crop,” he said.

He said that the PPP wanted to end the politics of hatred. He rejected the opposition’s claim of poor governance in the province and said that Sindh was providing best healthcare facilities in the country.

MQM-P’s Khawaja Izhar-ul-Hassan said it was PPP’s 15th consecutive budget. “The budget amount has been increased to 900 times than what it was in 2008 but the situation in the province had not been improved,” he retorted.

He said that the provincial government had claimed to have spent Rs15,026 billion in the development sector during its 15-year rule, but the condition of people in the constituencies of treasury members was still ‘poor’.

“The provincial government is giving Rs500bn subsidy to agriculturists in different heads and in return receiving nominal taxes,” he said. “Is provincial government spending Rs500bn in Karachi,” he questioned.

Syed Abdul Rasheed of the MMA also termed the budget a gimmick of numbers and said that the old schemes had not been completed but new schemes were incorporated to influence the upcoming general elections.

He said that the people of Lyari were deprived of potable water, asking when will they have their basic needs like water? He also demanded an increase in the budget of water schemes for Lyari and construction of five overhand tanks in the locality.

Tehreek Labbaik Pakistan’s Mufti Qasim Fakhri said that opposition members had been suggesting schemes for their constituencies for the last five years but none of them was incorporated.

He also demanded that the solar system be installed at mosques and they be exempted from other utility bills.

He said that law and order situation had not improved in Karachi as street crimes were on the rise.

The TLP member asked the provincial government to complete the safe city project.

PPP’s Faryal Talpur said that the people of Sindh voted for the PPP as it stood beside them in the difficult times. “The PPP helped the people affected by heavy rains and floods,” she said.

She said that it was performance of the PPP due to which the party managed to sweep local government elections from Karachi to Kashmore.

As many as 18 lawmakers including PPP’s Rana Hamir Singh, Ghulam Qadir Chandio, Syed Sardar Shah, Syeda Shehla Raza, Saleem Baloch, Giyan Chand Israni, Jam Ikramullah Dharejo and Abdul Bari Pitafi; GDA’s Arif Mustafa Jatoi, MQM-P’s Ali Khurshidi participated in the post-budget discussion.

Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani adjourned the house to Saturday (today) at 10am.

Published in Dawn, June 17th, 2023