'PTI govt fulfilled promise of Southern Punjab Secretariat'.

LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar has said the PTI-led government has fulfilled the promise of the Southern Punjab Secretariat made with the people of southern Punjab.

Additional Chief Secretary (South) and Additional IG (South) have been posted and both will assume their duties from July 1st. Meanwhile, non-transferable funds have been allocated for the backward districts. 33 percent funds have been reserved for southern Punjab and 1.5 million rupees are earmarked for southern Punjab Secretariat, he added.

Addressing the Punjab assembly session after the approval of provincial budget 2020-21, the CM paid tributes to Speaker Punjab assembly, Deputy Speaker and others who took an active part in the budget session. Besides the onslaught of coronavirus, the chief minister said the possibility of floods and another locusts attack are also anticipated. At the outset of the coronavirus, the Punjab government constituted a cabinet committee for corona control and imposed a corona emergency. Then, the testing capacity was 100 only but today, this capacity has reached to 12000 daily with the number of government testing labs reaching to 17. More than 5 lakh are tested in Punjab and there is no shortage of medicines for coronavirus, he added. Along with it, there are 9276 oxygen beds, 2600 high dependency units and 2302 ventilators. The government announced additional pay for doctors, health professionals, rescue staff and frontline staff engaged in the treatment of corona patients. The Shaheed Package was also announced for those laying their lives during corona duties, he said.

The CM said that 24 districts have been affected by locust attack but the damages were controlled to a large extent due to the timely steps. He said that one billion rupees were issued to PDMA and pesticides were sprayed at eight lakh acres to destroy locust swarms. He added that corona related App, information system and locusts surveillance-board have been launched by the government. I have also visited more than 25 districts to take stock of the field situation, he added. Punjab has also distributed 165 billion rupees among the needy under Ehsaas Programme. The corona has emerged as a big trial and Punjab got 635 billion rupees less revenue but I directed the finance team to present real figures instead of playing with the jugglery of the words. This budget is based on genuine data and figures, he asserted. Punjab needs 1300 billion rupees to complete...