Balochistan Govt Unveils Rs612.7b Budget.

QUETTA -- Balochistan Budget for the next fiscal year with a total outlay of Rs 612.7 billion was presented in the provincial assembly in Quetta on Tuesday evening. Finance Minister Abdul Rehman Khetran presented the budget.

In the budget for the next fiscal year, Rs367 billion are allocated for non-development expenditures, while 191.5 billion rupees are allocated for developmental expenditures. Similarly, Rs133 billion are set aside for more than 3000 ongoing development schemes, while 59 billion rupees are placed for new development schemes. A sum of 21 billion rupees has been allocated for the agriculture sector.

Also, Balochistan Minister for Finance, Communication and Works (C and W), Sardar Abdul Khetran said the provincial government allocated Rs1.75 billion to cope the financial problems of food security. The minister made this statement while presenting the budget of Financial 2022-23 during the budget session of Balochistan Assembly on Tuesday.

The Balochistan government on Tuesday presented a deficit budget with a total outlay of Rs. 612.79 billion.

Presenting the budget, the finance minister said that the provincial government would get Rs. 370.33 billion from the federal government under the National Finance Commission (NFC) award whereas the budget deficit is declared over Rs.72 billion.

The government of Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) and its allies has so far presented three budgets and this is the fourth budget being presented before the House, he added.

Finance minister, in his speech, announced that the government had decided to increase the salaries of the government employees by 15 percent on their basic salaries as of 2017 besides increasing pension by 15 percent.

'As many as 2,850 vacancies have been created to provide jobs to the jobless people in Balochistan,' he noted, adding the province would get Rs. 14.36 billion from the foreign support fund and Rs.40 billion on the account of the Sui Gas lease.

Highlighting the provincial government priorities, he said government accords priority to health and education sector as Rs.6.60 billion were allocated for the provision of medicines to patients across Balochistan.

'Our government has completed its eight-month term. This period is too short to evaluate the performance of any...