Federal cabinet approves Ramadan Relief Package worth Rs7.8bn

ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet has approved Ramadan Relief Package worth Rs7.8 billion on 19 essential items to facilitate the common people during the holy month through the network of Utility Stores across Pakistan.

Briefing media about the decisions taken by the federal cabinet, which met here on Tuesday with Prime Minister Imran Khan in the chair, Minister for Industries and Production Hammad Azhar said earlier this subsidy was available on five items only.

He said sale of the Utility Stores Corporation (USC) is likely to reach Rs100 billion this year and it is expected that USC will earn some profit as well.

Hammad Azhar said the cabinet has also approved to run two urea small plants of private sectors from this month to meet requirements of the farmers. He said large scale manufacturing showed a growth of 9.1 percent in January this year.

Speaking on the occasion, Minister for Science and Technology Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said the cabinet ordered forensic audit of the loss making entities and in the first phase, ten such entities will pass through this process, which will be completed by 30 June this year.

He said it is worth mentioning that 51 out of 85 loss-making State Owned Enterprises have become profitable due to prudent polices of the government. He said approval was also granted to the new arms license policy about prohibited and non-prohibited bore.

He said the cabinet too approved issuance of smart cards to Afghan refugees, having Proof of Registration (PoR) cards so that their life can be made easy and for swift resolution of their problems.

The Minister for Science and Technology said tax exemption was granted on auto-disable syringes to prevent spread of various diseases.

He said the cabinet was informed that only 27 percent of Pakistan's population is availing the facility of piped gas and the government is working on formulating a mechanism to extend this facility to majority of the population.

He said the cabinet also validated decisions of the Institutional Reforms Committee and Prime Minister Imran Khan directed to expedite the reforms process. He said the cabinet gave ex post facto to 17 platoons of Gilgit-Baltistan Scouts for security duty.

Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said accountability and transparency in elections are the two pillars of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's politics for which Prime Minister Imran Khan directed that federal cabinet be briefed on weekly-basis in electronic voting machines to make the polling process credible and transparent. He said the cabinet also expressed concern over the growing cases of Covid-19.