It was reported by Geo News that the interim budget has been approved by the caretaker cabinet in Punjab, which has been in power since November 2023. The budget is slated for the next four months from November 2023 to February 2024.
At a meeting chaired by caretaker chief minister Mohsin Naqvi in Lahore just two months before the general elections which are expected to take place in the last week of January next year, the interim cabinet approved a budget that will amount to Rs2,08 trillion.
Punjab’s interim cabinet has approved the Punjab’s budget for the second quarter, which concludes on October 31, 2023, as the last quarter of the fiscal year winds down.
There are 351 billion rupees allocated by the cabinet for development in the province in the next three months, the majority of which is allocated to ongoing projects in the province, according to the cabinet. As part of this budget, approval has also been given to allocate Rs50 billion to provide relief to the people of the province affected by the natural disaster
A total sum of Rs1.72 trillion has been allocated by the interim government for non-development expenditures, while a total sum of Rs355 billion has been allocated for ongoing development programs.
Using foreign funding of Rs33 billion, the cabinet intends to complete the development schemes on time in accordance with the development plan.
Non-development expenditures have been allocated Rs170 billion for salaries, while Rs130 billion has been allocated for pensions, with the rest of the budget being allocated to administrative, routine and operational expenses.
The Punjab Caretaker Information Minister Amir Mir spoke to a press conference after the cabinet meeting in Lahore, where he announced that at least Rs2 billion had been set aside for information technology in the interim budget, while Rs10 billion has been approved for road and building repairs, Rs208 billion has been approved for the health sector and Rs222 billion is being allocated for education.
A Rs 1.8 billion budget has been allocated by the caretaker government to the National Health Support Programme, while a Rs 5 billion budget has been set aside for Punjab textbooks. In order to combat climate change, an amount of around Rs7.3 billion has been allocated.
In order to retire the wheat debt, the minister pointed out that the provincial government had paid Rs83 billion to the provincial government.
There has been an allocation of Rs10 billion to the agricultural sector, as well as Rs80 billion for the repayment of federal loans, while at least Rs10 billion has been allocated to priority projects.
There is a minimum wage of Rs32,000 for workers that will be introduced from July 1, 2023 according to the interim budget, which is set to be effective from July 1, 2023 onwards.
Punjab’s interim government was prepared to go to the cabinet with its proposed budget for the second quarter of the current financial year 2023-2024, according to a press release from the government before the meeting.
After the last six months of the previous government led by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) were consumed by the Naqvi-led government, which presented its first four-month budget in June this year from July to October, allocating Rs1.72 trillion for various expenditures after having consumed the remaining six months of the budget approved by the previous government.
There has been a lot of concern regarding the budget due to the lack of documentation containing details regarding how the allocated funds would be spent by the caretaker government before the general elections that were expected to be held at the end of this month.
It was apprehensions about the rightful use of the allocated funds for the projects that were meant for the development of the province as well as subsidies that arose when the interim cabinet released its first budget in June of this year. Although the primary focus of the book was on the political agenda of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, which led the coalition government in the center up until August 2023, it centered on the political agenda of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
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