KARACHI, June 12: Lack of resources is widely blamed for the slow pace of socio-economic progress of Sindh, but a closer look into the actual problem reveals that lack of will on the part of government is more responsible because it does not fully utilize even the available resources.
The Sindh government, in a budget document — Review of Annual Development Programme 2004-2005 (July 2004-April 2005), admitted that it could release a little over half (57.467 per cent)of the promised funds for the purpose.
This appeared contrary to its tall claim of having left no stone unturned to change the socioeconomic destiny of the poor masses.
Moreover, the people of Sindh would have been lucky enough had these meagre funds been utilized fully.
The mighty bureaucracy of Sindh, rightly accused of lacking both the will and zeal to serve people, utilized only 60.7 per cent of the already slashed funds.
The figure quoted in the document under the head of ‘Provincial ADP’ puts the allocation at Rs12,342 million for a total of 609 uplift schemes, but the government released only Rs7,092.619 million whereas the bureaucracy utilized just Rs4,306.336 million.
There could hardly be any excuse to justify this dismal standard of performance to serve the masses, a huge proportion of which is being forced to live below the poverty line day by day.
This wide gap in the government’s words and deeds seems astonishing, even in a backward province of a third world country. If this trend persists, one could only hope for the release of Rs8.4 billion out of the Rs24 billion funds earmarked for the uplift plan this year, which is already an ‘unfunded’ segment, as the Sindh Finance Minister, Syed Sardar Ahmad, has clarified in his post-budget press conference.
If the data of the last year’s provincial ADP is further analyzed, more interesting things could surface. For example, Rs3,000 million were allocated for three schemes under the head of ‘special packages’ but not a single penny was released for these schemes.
Similarly, Rs8 million were allocated for five schemes of Environment Department, but again the release was ‘nil’. In sharp contrast, under the head of ‘rural development’ the Works and Services Department was released Rs350 million, being the total amount allocated for the purpose, and 100 per cent of it was utilized.
The poorest performance in fund utilization was of the Culture and Tourism Department, as Rs40 million was allocated for its 21 schemes and Rs13.415 million were released but it could utilize only Rs1.873 million (14 per cent).
The other inefficient departments were Manpower and Employment (allocation: Rs42 million, release: Rs26.831 million, utilization: Rs5.177 million (19.3 per cent), Women Development (allocation: Rs18 million, release: Rs5.5 million, utilization: Rs1.263 million (23 per cent), Fisheries and Livestock (allocation Rs55 million, release: Rs39.860 million, utilization: Rs14.322 million (35.9 per cent), Science and Information Technology (allocation Rs120 million, release: Rs50.62 million, utilization: Rs16.21 million (32 per cent), and Education (allocation Rs660 million, release: Rs471.052 million, utilization: Rs180.773 (38.4 per cent).
Amongst the high performers were the departments of Industries (allocation: Rs60 million, release: Rs51.372 million, utilization: Rs42 million (81.9 per cent), Information Achieves (allocation: Rs25 million, release: 10 million, utilization: Rs7.947 million (79.5 per cent), and Forest and Wildlife (allocation: Rs79.5 million, release: Rs82.190 million, utilization: Rs63.071 million (76.7 per cent).
Interestingly, the provincial government itself appeared not satisfied with the pace of progress.
It confesses in the same document: “Overall provincial progress of development schemes being executed by the provincial administrative departments with reference to the allocation of Rs12,342 million though seems not satisfactory, but the same is less due to Rs3,000 million earmarked for Special Packages for Karachi, Hyderabad and Rural Sindh.” — PPI