JHELUM/GUJAR KHAN, June 29: District Assembly Jhelum and tehsil councils of Pind Dadan Khan and Gujar Khan approved development oriented budgets for the fiscal years 2004-2005 during the specially summoned budget sessions of the respective houses, the official sources said.

Chaudhry Farrakh Altaf, District Nazim, presented the Rs1.508 billion budget for the Jhelum District for the year 2004-2005 that was approved with majority vote. The budget session was presided over by Naib Nazim Syed Aqeel Shah.

While explaining the salient features of the budget the district Nazim said that emphasis had been laid on the development projects as well as to solve the public problems.

He said that the expected income of the district was Rs19.029 million. He added that Rs300 million was lying with the government under the heads of its income. The council will get Rs980.72 million under the interim award from the provincial finance commissions and Rs5.518 million under the pension fund of the defunct district council employees.

He further elaborated that Rs1.013 billion has been allocated to meet the expenses of the salaries of the government employees, office management and Rs99 million will be required to pay the allowances to the government employees under the recently announced raise in their salaries.

Mr Farrakh said that an allocation of Rs20.49 million has been made for drought emergency relief (DERA), including Rs20.49 million from Punjab governor programme and Rs6.5 million. For the district development programme an amount of Rs74.85 million has been allocated'

For development projects an allocation of Rs14 million has been made, while Rs0.94 million has been set aside for enhancement of literacy rate in the district, the Nazim claimed.

Giving the details of the development schemes the Nazim said that Rs30.32 million would be spent on the construction of roads and Rs140.50 million for the chief minister's education sector reforms. An allocation of Rs20 million had been made for tehsil Sohawa and PD Khan for the completion of the ongoing development projects.