PESHAWAR
\nCaretaker Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Muhammad Azam Khan here Thursday said that the provincial government is adhering to strict financial discipline, and through a number of measures under austerity policy, unnecessary expenditures have been drastically reduced whereas prudent and judicious and realistic use of available financial resources is also being ensured.
\nHe added that as a result of the above mentioned measures, the incumbent caretaker government has not yet taken any overdraft from banks.
\nHe said that due to huge recruitments during the previous tenures, the budget of salaries and pensions of the provincial departments and government universities has increased manifolds due to which the provincial government as well as the higher educational institutes are facing financial crunches as major chunk of provincial government budget is spent on salaries and pension.
\nHe was talking to the participants of 25th National Security Workshop of National Defence University who called on him here on Thursday. Major General Raza Aizad from National Defense University, Islamabad, Chief Secretary Nadeem Aslam Chaudhary, Additional Chief Secretaries Muhammad Abid Majeed, Syed Imtiaz Hussain Shah and Secretary Finance Amir Sultan Tareen were also present on the occasion.
\nThe chief minister said that due to decades long unstability in the region, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province especially the erstwhile tribal belt has been badly affected resulting in law & order situation, poor economy and slow paced development, adding the newly merged tribal districts needed special attention of the government for their development and redressal of their decades long deprivations.
\nHe maintained that commitments made by the federal government and the federating units with regard to the fast track development of the Newly Merged Districts on the time of merger had not yet been fulfilled.
\nAzam Khan remarked that the province is not getting its due shares in various federal transfers including NFC, net hydel profit and oil & gas royalty etc. due to which the provincial government is faced with a major challenge of financial crunches.
\nThe participants were briefed about the overall security situation, administrative and financial affairs and development portfolio of the province, and told that crackdown is underway against all types of illegal specturum including smuggling, extortion, hundi-hawala, fake documentation etc, and added that an effective coordination mechanism amongst civil administration, security forces, intelligence institutions, federal and provincial entities has been established for this purpose.
\nBesides, Counter Terrorism department has also been strengthened on modern lines in order to effectively deal with the issues of extortion and terrorism in the province.
\nIt was informed that profiling of non-custom paid vehicles in the newly merged districts and Malakand Division is also in progress. The participants were told that law enforcing agencies have made significant achievements in the operation against terrorism and illegal spectrum.
\nBriefing about the development portfolio of the province, it was informed that the totaly development oulay of settled areas consists of 1505 development projects with a total costof Rs. 1794 billion; and similarly, the development portfolio of the NMDs consists of 686 development projects with estimated cost of Rs.897 billion.
\nThe participants were briefed that the province is mostly dependent on federal transfers for its revenues as 94% of its revenue comes from various federal receipts.
\nIt was told that with the merger of erstwhile FATA into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the population of the province has increased but the share of the province in NFC Award has not been increased accordingly which needs to be revised to enable the province to get its due share; and added thta as per the existing population after merger of erstwhile FATA, the NFC shares of the province comes to 19.6% of the total but the province is getting only 14.6%.
\nThe participants were apprised that the provincial government was taking concrete measures under a well devised strategy to increase its revenue by exploiting its potentials in various sectors including hydro power, agriculture, mines & minerals and tourism adding that health and education sectors have been the top most priority of the provincial government and significant financial resources are being spents on these sectors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
PESHAWAR Caretaker Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Muhammad Azam Khan here Thursday said that the provincial government is adhering to strict financial discipline, and through a number of measures under austerity policy, unnecessary expenditures have been drastically reduced whereas prudent and judicious and realistic use of available financial resources is also being ensured. He added that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-362585","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-top-news"},"yoast_head":"\n