PPP hints at quitting govt over unkept promises.

KARACHI -- Pakistan PeoAples Party (PPP) Chairman and Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has said it will be too difficult for his party to remain part of the federal government if the centre does not fulfil its promises of giving relief to flood victims of Sindh.

Mr Bhutto-Zardari also objected to the manner the digital census exercise was being conducted, saying it was unacceptable that elections in one province take place based on a different census, and other provincial polls are held based on a 'flawed' digital census.

These reservations were expressed by the PPP chairman in his address after inaugurating 'Subsidy PrograAmme: Reimbursement for Wheat Seed' here on Sunday.

Under the programme, Mr Bhutto-Zardari, whose party rules in Sindh, transferred Rs8.39 billion from the provincial budget to the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) for disbursement of Rs5,000 per acre to each small grower holding up to 12 acres of agricultural land.

Since Rs13.5bn was needed to provide relief to the flood-hit farmers through the subsidy programme, it was decided that the federal government would give Rs4.7bn grant and the remaining Rs8.39bn would be provided by the Sindh government, he said, reminding the PDM-led government in the centre of its promise.

'We [will] take up this issue in the National Assembly,' he said, adding that he would also speak to the premier to fulfil the promises made to the flood victims, otherwise it would be very difficult for the PPP to be part of the federal government.

Expressing reservations over the ongoing seventh national and first-ever digital census, the PPP chairman said census was being conducted at a time when general elections were being anticipated. 'How it is justified that election to one provincial assembly is held on the basis of 2018 census, while the other on the digital census,' he wondeAred, referring to the eleAcAtions of Punjab and Khyber-PakhtunAkhwa assemblies.

'If the census is to be conducted in the same 'fraudulent' way, it is not acceptable to the PPP,' he categorically said, adding that the Sindh government would not support the ongoing census if the federal government did not address the objections.

The programme was organised by the agriculture department in collaboration with BISP here at CM House and was attended by Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, MPA Faryal Talpur, former chief minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah, Sindh chapter president of the party Nisar Khuhro, federal...