KARACHI: As many as 29 more lawmakers on Tuesday expressed their views on the provincial budget in the Sindh Assembly on the second day of debate, taking the number of speakers to 55.

While the opposition members rejected the provincial finance plan and termed it a “black budget”, the treasury members said that the provincial government had presented a “very balanced” and “people-friendly” budget even in prevailing difficult economic conditions.

It was a relatively calm day in a thinly attended house, but the atmosphere became extremely tense twice over the remarks of some members from both sides of the aisle, and Acting Speaker Anthony had to ask them to show restraint.

The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan members became enraged over remarks of Pakistan Peoples Party’s Sadia Jawed regarding the ‘martyrs’ of their party.

29 members take part in debate

They stood up to lodge a strong protest on her utterances, but took to their seats after the intervention of the Acting Speaker.

Moments later, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf-backed Sunni Ittehad council members lost their control when Ms Jawed passed another remark on the PTI leadership.

They also fiercely protested, but were calmed down by the Speaker who strictly asked the PPP member to confine her speech to the budget only.

Most of the members from the two sides kept on making jibes at each other in their speeches, speaking little on the budget and its possible impact on the people.

However, PPP’s Nida Khuhro emerged only one and only member to articulately restrict her speech to the budget, avoiding jibes, criticism and rejoinders.

In her eloquent speech, she highlighted the important features of the budget and said that an ad hoc relief allowance of 10 to 12 per cent was given to the provincial government employees, while pensions were increased by seven per cent.

Ms Khuhro, who is also parliamentary secretary for the health department, said that emphasis was given on healthcare in the provincial financial plan and the health sector budget was increased eight per cent with allocation of Rs326.5 billion.

She said that the provincial government’s emphasis was on universal healthcare as it

was a right, not a privilege. “Flagship institutions like NICVD treated over 1.4 million patients, including from other provinces,” she added.

The PPP MPA said that the NICVD was expanded to Quetta where over 350 paediatric heart surgeries were conducted.

She said that over two million patients were treated and 11,419 angioplasties, 31,852 angiographies, and 2,145 heart surgeries were conducted at the Sindh Institute of Cardio-Vascular Diseases.

The PPP MPA said that 308 liver, 44 kidney, 84 cochlear and 51 bone marrow transplants were performed at the Gambat Institute of Medical Science.

She said that beds at the JPMC were increased to 4,041 from 2,092 and it served four million patients annually.

“The JPMC also has world’s only free CyberKnife and Tomotherapy centre,” she added.

The PPP MPA termed the uncontrolled population growth as mother of all challenges and said that Pakistan was the fifth most populous country with the population of over 240 million people.

She said that Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (CPR) was still dangerously low in Sindh.

The MPA said that the province needed 10,419 new schools, 145 BHUs, 1,452 doctors and 968 nurses annually.

She underlined the need of urgent reforms to control the population growth as current pressure did not match by funding or attention.

She urged the provincial government to increase contraceptive funding and supply and fill vacant population welfare posts.

The PPP MPA said that the population growth was a national emergency — not just a health issue but a survival issue.

“No budget will be enough unless we control population growth,” she concluded.

MQM’s Faheem Patni complained that there were immense public problems in his constituency which no one could solve. “I have told the people of the constituency that PPP will not provide them water,” he said adding that the entire opposition strongly rejected the “black budget in the history of Sindh”.

He retorted that the budget would definitely make a difference in the lives of those who made the budget and not in the lives of the people.

MQM’s Moeed Anwar said that dirty water had entered the Isa Nagri graveyard. “Karachi gives 60 per cent of the revenue to the federal treasury, but despite this, its condition is not good,” he lamented.

The house was adjourned to Wednesday.

Published in Dawn, June 18th, 2025