ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) president and opposition leader in the National Assembly, Shehbaz Sharif Saturday expressed grave concern and alarm over the mounting circular debt.

In a statement, Shehbaz questioned the government's management saying it had increased electricity tariffs, cut down subsidy and yet still the circular debt was on the rise.

"How else would you define theft and incompetence? The people are paying record high tariffs and yet the circular debt is shooting through the roof. This report by the Energy Ministry is a charge sheet against the PTI government," Shehbaz said.

He said over the past three years, the circular debt had doubled to 2.5 trillion.

From high transmission losses to revenue collection, the performance of every department of the energy sector is dismal, he added.

The PTI's claims of reducing circular debt to zero by end of 2020 had also fallen flat on their face.

Circular debt: The perennial problem

Instead the circular debt had increased at a higher pace since 2018.

He said even after crushing people under additional Rs500 billion the debt was skyrocketing.

He pointed out that this was the consequence of producing expensive electricity through furnace oil any diesel to benefit the "blue-eyed ATMs".

This government added Rs464 billion in first year, Rs538 billion in second, and in the third year Rs130 billion so far.

The PML-N president said the PTI government could not fulfil a single promise with the people or the federating units.

"They only know how to dump the avalanche of their failures, incompetence and corruption on the people of Pakistan," he added.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021