In an astonishing move, the Sindh government has allocated Rs 1.16 billion for a pilot project of tagging livestock approved by CM Sindh under non-Annual Development Program (ADP) scheme, for FY 2018-19. According to sources, the Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah had allowed the department to undertake the Livestock Tagging and Traceability project under the traditional PC-I mode as non-ADP scheme during last financial year and gave directions to Planning and Development (P&D) department to process the PC-I at the earliest.
Following the said approval, the PC-I of the project titled 'Livestock Zoning Project Sindh' as a pilot has been prepared in no time and forwarded to the P&D department for further decision as this project is being patronized by the front man of one of the highly influential political figures in Sindh politics.
Moreover, the PC-I of the project, which was earlier approved under non-ADP scheme by CM, has been received to P&D department on March 15, 2018 and the technical committee, which was supposed to carry out long deliberations, has given go-ahead to this scheme (1062) on same date.
Therefore, this scheme has been approved by Provincial Development Working Party (PWDP) within six days (March 21, 2018) and later incorporated in Sindh budget FY 18-19 with Rs 1.16 billion allocation.
Replying to a question, sources said that the non-ADP project could not be inducted in ADP without board's approval however said requirement was utterly neglected in this scheme with the best reason known to the concerned authority. Furthermore, sources said that the budgeted cost of this pilot project for livestock tagging in divisions of Karachi and Hyderabad was at Rs 3.856 billion for the period of 36 months (2017-18 to 2019-20).