Senior Advisor to Chief Minister Punjab, Sirdar Zulfiqar Ali Khan Khosa on Wednesday said that financial position of the PML-N led Punjab government is very sound, as "we are following strict financial discipline in every department." Khosa said that Punjab government has also repaid of Rs 18 billion out of Rs 51 billion loan to State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), while the remaining amount of loan would be paid in next 33 months with equal instalments.
He added that the over draft is the facility of the State Bank and the over draft of Punjab is much less than the limit fixed by the State Bank. According to him, the Punjab government has also saved Rs 2.8 billion in the head of current expenditures for the first time in the history of Punjab by ensuring financial discipline. He further said the Punjab government is implementing a comprehensive austerity drive and we have controlled our non-development expenditures as well. He said that Punjab government has billion of rupees surplus in its treasury from January 2011 onward.
Sirdar Zulfiqar Ali Khan Khosa said that Rs 19 billion tax was collected during the first 7 month of current fiscal year, which is 27 percent more as compared to last fiscal year 2009-10. He said that during current fiscal year, tax target has been fixed to Rs 40.4 billion, while Rs 51 billion would be received from GST on services being collected by Federal Government.
He said that during last fiscal year 2009-10, the Punjab government collected Rs 30 billion tax and federal government did not pay outstanding amount of Rs 3 billion electricity duty to Punjab. Had Rs 3 billion of electricity duty was paid, our tax collection would have been Rs 33 billion during last fiscal year, he said.
Senior Advisor to Chief Minister said that Punjab government never had a default of Rs 520 billion and former provincial Finance Minister had presented fabricated facts and figures in a bid to mislead the people of Punjab by giving wrong statistics. He said that there is no default of Punjab government as its financial position is very strong and former Finance Minister also tried to muddle up facts and figures on the basis of domestic and foreign loans. "One should keep in mind, most of the loans have been received on 50-year long term conditions.
Reacting to the address of the President Asif Ali Zardari to the joint session of the Parliament, Khosa termed it "most disappointing" as it contained only promises and nothing concrete for the development of the country and welfare of the masses was announced.