PESHAWAR: Advisor to KP CM on Finance, Muzammil Aslam Khyber Pakhtunkhwa receives 93 percent of funds from the federal government, while only seven percent of the provincial receipts come from its own sources.

He told this while briefing the introductory meeting of the Standing Committee of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on the Department of Finance held here with Chairman MPA Arbab Muhammad Usman Khan in the chair here on Tuesday.

Besides, Advisor on Finance Muzammil Aslam, Members of the Provincial Assembly Shafiullah, Mukhtiar Ahmad Khan, Muhammad Khurshid and Rashad Khan, Special Secretary Finance Abidullah Kaka Khel, other officials also attended the meeting. The meeting was informed in detail about the role and functions of the department.

Chairman Arbab Muhammad Usman Khan asked for the details and documents of various schemes from the Finance Department for the next meeting so that the functions and role of the department could be reviewed in detail.

The Advisor on Finance Muzammil Aslam said that for the current financial year, an amount of Rs.37 billion have been allocated for the health card plus project, out of which Rs.30 billion are for the settled areas, and Rs.7 billion for the merged districts. He said that Rs.15 billion have been released so far while Rs.4 billion more will be released this week.

It was told in the meeting that the government spends 7000 rupees on each child studying in a public sector school, on which Chairman Standing Committee Arbab Muhammad Usman Khan said that such a monthly fee is not even for top private schools, but still why the performance of government schools is disappointing?

The Advisor on Finance also told the committee that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has collected Rs.100 billion than the tax collection target for the month of August which means the province will get an amount of Rs.7 billion to Rs.8 billion less than the estimated receipts. He further said that the merged districts have been administratively integrated with the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but not financially and in the same way their funds come from the federal government. He told the forum that the federal government pays only 66 billion rupees for the salaries of the employees of the merged districts, while the salary expenditure is 104 billion rupees.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024