Debate on Rs 87.436 billion supplementary budget begins: opposition MPAs criticise government

Punjab Assembly that began debate on Rs 87.436 billion supplementary budget 2010-11 here on Friday, the opposition legislators criticised the government for continuing with the practice of spending beyond the approved budgetary amounts. These members termed this undemocratic and said it reflects financial indiscipline and disregard of the taxpayers money.
Opening the debate in the House, PPP's Ehsanul Haq Nolatia termed the supplementary budget as an ugly tradition, which should be done away with. He said in democratic societies supplementary budgets were small and justified only in case of emergencies and calamities with the mentioning of actual reasons for such spending.
He mentioned that out of the Rs 87.436 billion, Rs 67 billion was spent in violation of rules and regulations. The member asked the reason behind the construction of Kalma Chowk flyover without getting approval from the august house. He alleged that rulers had considered public exchequer as their personal asset and were using it to cover up for their political designs and shortcomings.
MPA Samina Naveed said huge amounts were being spent on publicising Danish schools while over 35,000 government schools lacked basic facilities. She pointed out it would have been better if that money was spent on upgrading the existing schools. Legislator Najmi Saleem alleged that funds allocated for the uplift of minorities were used for purchasing the loyalties of the turncoats.
The member demanded minorities' quota in Ashiana housing scheme, yellow cab and other such ventures. Ali Sher Gorchani MPA alleged that successive governments of PML-Q and PPP had been making false claims of serving the people of southern Punjab while it was Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif who had done the actual services for the people of that region. He said during the floods, President Zardari and PM Gilani only visited the area once only for a short period.
In the debate, an exchange of hot words occurred between the women members of PML-N and PPP when Sakeena Shaheen of PML-N alleged massive corruption in Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) and claimed that she had documentary evidence of massive bungling of funds in the name of the welfare of the poor. She also claimed that video evidence was also available on the reported corruption.
Irritated by the comments a number of PPP members stood on their seats to began accusing their counterpart from PML-N of making baseless accusations. These members were led by Sajida Mir who warned Sakeena Shaheen of dire consequences if she again uttered the name of Benazir Bhutto or BISP. However, Speaker Rana Iqbal warned the members of serious action if they did not maintain order and sanctity of the House.
Rana Fareedi legislator of PPP termed supplementary budget a proof of PML-N government's bad governance. Another MPA from PPP said that much had been said about plundering public money but the need of the hour was to devise a mechanism to check it and make a track of it. Dr samia Amjad MPA said she had not been paid her development funds of Rs 8 million per annum for the last three years and pointing that she had made a request to the provincial government to spend that amount on Mayo hospital eye ward which badly lacked basic facilities resulting in suffering of large number of patients.
The MPA complained about the lengthy bureaucratic process of disbursing grant in aid to the widows who had to wait for over a year besides standing on shameful queues for receiving a small amount. She demanded simplifying the process and improving its transparency.