Pak Army’s discipline, professionalism be replicated in civil institutions: Fawad

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Science and Technology on Tuesday said Pakistan Army was a professional and disciplined institution whom working is totally merit based.

“We should learn from their experience and develop all civilian institutions on the pattern of Pakistan Army,” Fawad Chaudhry said while taking part in budget debate in National Assembly.

He said due to its professionalism, Pakistan Army had become the 6th largest armed force of the world.

Criticizing the previous governments, the minister said there was a time when PML-N and PPP managed vote by calling each other thieves and robbers, and then they formed their government with help of Maulana Fazlur Rehman.

He said only one change in politics had now changed the whole scenario and that change was Prime Minister Imran Khan who had embarked upon the narrative of accountability across the board.

Imran Khan had fulfilled his pledges of capturing corrupt and robbers, and he would not sit calm until all such corrupt people are taken to the task.

Fawad said the incumbent government was committed to enhance country’s capability in realm of science and technology and in the upcoming budget, an allocation of Rs 43 billion had been proposed for the development of the sector.

He said the government for the first time reduced civilian budget by Rs 50 billion and Pak Army had also decided to withdraw annual budget raise.

Speaking on country’s debts, the minister said from 1947 to 2008, Pakistan’s total debts were around Rs 6 trillion with which “we built Islamabad city, motorways, mangla and tarbela dams, and atomic power, however during previous 10 years the debts increased from 6 trillion to Rs 30,000 trillions.

He said leader of opposition had offered the government to go for a charter of economy, however due to some reasons they withdrew from their offer.

On point of personal explanation,  Khawaja Asif said the government itself conveyed a message of  Charter of economy to the opposition.

This charter should be among political parties as was done in Bangladesh, he said adding the PML-N still believed that there should be charter of economy among the political parties to improve the country’s economic situation.

Khawaja Saad Rafique said “before going on charter of economy, we should go for charter of democracy in which all political parties should be involved”.

He said no charge sheet was extended to him despite being in custody of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for last seven months.

Criticizing the federal budget 2019-20, he said the most affected out of the proposed budget was the salaried class for whom the government had proposed unjustified additional taxes which should be withdrawn.

He urged the government to clarify about the agreement signed with China with respect of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project of Railway ML-1.

Talking on the establishment of accountability commission, he said PML-N had also done a wrong decision by establishing similar type of commission.

He also urged the government to accept political realities which could not be subdued by any means.