Punjab sets new Standards in Budget 2013-14

Punjab Government continues to set new and higher records for the rest of the provinces by giving a revolutionary budget for the year 2013-14. Or should I call it an evolutionary budget as the things seem to have been moving in the same direction for the last five years and the steady growth in the fields of education and developmental projects in the deprived of areas of the province has been a hallmark of the provincial budgets during the past few years. It is a fact that the education and health budgets have been rising in a steady manner since the year 2008 when PMLN’s government took over the province under the leadership of Chief Minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif and with 195 billion rupees spent during the year 2012, the education budget has been increased to 210 billion this year which is swooping 23.41% of the total budget that stands at 897 billion PKR.

This budget includes the hallmark projects of Shehbaz Sharif Youth Initiative Laptop Scheme and also the Ujala Solar Lamp Project that are gifted among the deserving students from all parts of the province purely on merit basis. At the same time the development of poor areas have also been focused in the budget by allocating a handsome amount to the Punjab Education Fund in which the under developed areas where government schools have not been set up, private schools are subsidized by the provincial government. Number of Danish Schools is also being increased and it is quite a well-known fact already that these schools are set up in the most deprived of areas and are for the poorest of the poor among the society where these students can get international standard education totally Free of Cost.

It is quite heartening to see all the provinces allocating large sums of money for the Education. Sindh has allocated 21.42% of the budget to this sector while Khyber Pakhtoonkhuwah (KPK) government has allocated 19.3% to education in their respective budgets for the year 2013-14. KPK Finance Minister, Mr. Siraj ul Haq termed this high allocation as “Education Emergency” in the province while making his budget speech in the provincial assembly on Monday. But Punjab government however stands out in this race with the highest allocation for education this year as well and the benchmark that it has set for the other provinces will have to be followed. Punjab has already shown considerable performance in the previous years and as we saw World Bank praising Punjab Government for being on the road to achieve all its Millenium Development Goals. It was when Punjab was able to touch the 92% enrollment rate in the province in the year 2011. It has set a target of achieving 100% by the year 2015 and if its government continues to perform in a manner that it has been doing for the last five years, it’ll surely be able to meet the goal.

Other realms were also touched by the budget this year and one among them was 82 billion rupees allocation for the Health sector by the government which is 9.41% of the total budget. This is yet another evolutionary cum revolutionary step by the government. The government in the province under the dynamic leadership of Shehbaz Sharif was able to successfully deal with the malaise of Dengue that wreaked havoc in the province in 2011 when more than three thousand people were affected by the deadly disease and more than seven hundred people lost their lives. But arrangements were made by the government made it able to cope with it in a much better fashion in 2012 and only 100 people got affected and no life was lost while the experts from Sri Lanka and other parts of the world had predicted 25000 deaths that year.

Tradition continued in the South Punjab’s development as well which is considered to be the most backward area of Punjab. In the year 2007, only 15% budget was being spent on this area that comprises 30% population of the city. Under Paistan Muslim League’s government in the province of Punjab that started to function from 2008, this budget was gradually improved from 16% in 2008 to 32% this year with an additional 93 billion rupees in the development budget allocated for the cities and villages located in the same region.

The overall development budget of the province is 290 billion rupees. The PML (N) government has always been renowned for its pro-development practices and Ch. Ahsan Iqbal mentioned a few days earlier in a TV program sitting along with Arif Alvi on Geo that PMLN government is focusing on construction industry to make it a tool for economic revival. The idea was quite evident in the Punjab budget as well like the Federal budget and with such high allocation for development in the province it is quite clear that the government is going to produce a lot more jobs in the field for labor, factories (including cement, glass, steel etc.) and of course for engineers.

Metro Bus Project is also going to be expanded to Rawalpindi, Faisalabad and Multan which are the three largest cities of the province after Lahore while Lahore’s MBS is also going to be expanded to other areas of the city. Improvisation in transportation quality was a key feature in the previous tenure as well and the same will continue in this government as well as the intentions of the government are indicated from the first budget given by the provincial government.

As the Computerization of Landrecords in the province had started to take place in 2011 to end the Patwari System which is the root cause of several land disputes in the country especially the villages, the practice is going further as well as the province steps into the next round. KPK Government has also followed the step which is another indication that fixing things in this tenure is the main priority of the two governments.

It is courtesy the patience of the current Prime Minister and PMLN Chief Mian Nawaz Sharif who did not topple the government up and stood firm under pressure for the sake of democracy and the fruit is that today we are discussing budget, education, health and development in the city instead of the violations of constitutions committed by some usurpers. We hope that the state continues to function in a democratic manner and democracy continues in Pakistan so that we continue to discuss, criticize, appreciate and follow political parties on bases of their economic and developmental policies instead of mere rhetoric that has unfortunately been the practice in the country for the last several years.