Tarin doubts govt's ability to achieve targets.

ISLAMABAD -- Former finance minister Shaukat Tarin lambasted the government on Saturday for presenting a 'non-serious' budget based on 'unrealistic assumptions' and doubted its ability to achieve the targeted growth rate during the next fiscal year.

'This is a very non-serious kind of budget with unrealistic assumptions,' Mr Tarin told reporters at a press conference in Islamabad on Saturday alongside other PTI leaders, including former federal minister Omar Ayub Khan.

'They should understand that the numbers don't lie no matter how much spin-doctoring you do,' Mr Tarin said, criticising many figures and targets envisaged in the budget for various sectors and areas.

'The budget has a deficit of Rs4.2 trillion, Finance Minister Miftah Ismail has tried to befool the masses through jugglery of words,' he said. 'I ask the finance minister to be serious at least on the economy.'

Mr Ismail presented the budget on Friday for the next fiscal year. The Rs9.5tr budget aims for economic growth of five per cent.

Mr Tarin was sceptical of the government's stated growth target and believed that the agricultural and industrial sector targets might also not be met due to runaway inflation amid rising fuel and electricity prices.

He claimed inflation had already gone up to 24pc and unemployment could soar to 25pc to 30pc.

'It was because the government will impose a petroleum levy of up to Rs35, as they have set a target of Rs750 billion for the levy, which would bring another storm of inflation in the country,' he said.

Mr Tarin said the government had 'under and over-budgeted' many figures. 'There are many things [in the budget] which they've shown less and basically they've shown an income [target] which won't even be collected.'

He believed that the income tax should have been increased along with customs duties and GST.

The government has instead proposed giving relief to the salaried class, reducing the number of...