LARKANA: Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, chairman of Public Accounts Committee, has urged the government to broaden spectrum of Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) by including more families in its list of beneficiaries as 50 per cent population in Sindh is living below poverty line.

He said in a press statement, which was issued in the wake of his meeting with director general and other officials of BISP on Monday, that prevailing conditions in terms of poverty required an increase in the number of beneficiaries of BISP.

He said that 9500,000 families had been surveyed and of them 2400,000 had been registered under the programme. Every registered family was receiving Rs11,000 quarterly, he said.

Under a variety of reasons, recruitments were banned from time to time hence in order to address the issue of rising unemployment among youth the BISP was the only option available to the government to extend them financial support and help reduce poverty, he said.

Therefore, he said, BISP’s base should be expanded. The families whose per month income was less than Rs29,000 were eligible to be registered as beneficiary in the programme, he said.

He asked the BISP officials to increase the number of outlets keeping in view increasing number of beneficiaries at the existing centers. The BISP and Sindh Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority had inked an agreement to arm over 6,000 students with different skills, he said, adding that 36 per cent women registered with BISP would also be offered identical facilities with the cooperation of Asian Development Bank. The sole aim of this initiative was to help them stand on their own feet, he said.

He said that under the title of Benazir education scholars programme 2,161,465 children getting education from primary to higher secondary level were enrolled and they were regularly receiving Rs2500 to Rs4000 quarterly.

Under the Benazir Nutrition programme 748,000 pregnant women and neonatals were registered and presently 140 facilitation centres and 39 mobile teams were busy doing registration job and they were all getting regular financial support under the programme, he claimed.

He said that so far Rs70 billion relief amount had been distributed among 2.8 million flood affected people wheat subsidy had been paid to farmers and growers.

He said that 138 taluka level offices of BISP were established while work on setting up one-window operation centers was in progress. In this context, Sindh government was approached to provide government spaces, he said.

Published in Dawn, October 1st, 2024