In his budget speech, the CM said that revenue receipts were estimated at Rs 253.745 billion, ie Rs 27.388 billion higher than revised revenue estimates of Rs 226.357 billion of current fiscal year, but Rs 14.019 billion less than next fiscal year's expenditures.
Qaim said that following federal government decision, Sindh government had also decided to raise the salaries of government employees by 20 percent, which would cause an extra burden of Rs 10 billion on the budget. "Although we know that this budget has a big deficit of Rs 14 billion, the decision has been taken in view of the type of program that we must unfold for moving towards relief and economic reform agenda," he said.
He said that this deficit would be met through improving provincial revenue collection and mobilising additional revenue and undertaking an austerity drive for containing current expenditures. "We have accepted a longtime demand of police, bringing their salaries at par with Punjab Police, and an amount of Rs 570 million has been allocated on this account," he said.
GOVERNMENT TO GET RS 10 BILLION HIT ON ACCOUNT OF 20 PERCENT IN CREASE IN SALARIES: The Sindh Government has allocated highest figure of Rs 77.31 billion for Public Sector Development Program (PSDP), (excluding Rs 12 billion of District Government Annual Development Program) as compared to Rs 62.25 billion in revised estimates of fiscal year 2008, depicting an increase of Rs 15.06 billion.
PSDP comprises Rs 55 billion provincial Annual Development Program (ADP), Rs 12 billion for the district governments ADP, Rs 510 million drought emergency relief assistance (DERA), Rs 4.355 billion for foreign project assistance, Rs 2.735 billion Sindh development social services programme (SDSSP) and Rs 2.008 billion for Sindh Cities Improvement program.
The allocation for the provincial ADP has been raised by Rs 15 billion; ADP allocation for district government ADP has surged by Rs 2 billion; while foreign project assistance has been cut by Rs 1.305 billion in the next fiscal year budget.
The revenue receipts are estimated at Rs 207.836 billion, Rs 31.238 higher than current fiscal year revenue receipts of Rs 176.598 billion. The revenue receipts include Rs 102.396 billion tax assignment, Rs 8.659 billion federal special grant-in-aid, Rs 30.25 billion provisional receipts, Rs 40.796 billion straight transfer and Rs 25.732 billion districts support grant and other grants.
In addition, capital receipts have been estimated Rs 9.719 billion higher than the current fiscal year's, as these are estimated at Rs 14.495 billion for the next fiscal year as against the revised receipts of Rs 4.476 billion in fiscal year 2007-08.
Estimated current capital receipts comprise Rs 3.7 billion local payments, Rs 345 million from Sindh Devolved Social Service Programme, Rs 6.75 billion from World Bank, Rs one billion grants from European Commission and Rs 2.7 billion from of Asian Development Bank. Capital expenditures estimated Rs 9.46 billion against Rs 8.396 billion of revised budget of current fiscal year.
The overall revenue and capital receipts have been estimated at Rs 222.331 billion in the budget for the year 2008-09 against the revenue and capital expenditure of Rs 190.448 billion, a surplus of Rs 31.883 billion in the next budget.
Current revenue expenditures have been increased by Rs 17.125 billion to Rs 180.987 billion for the next fiscal year, while provisional expenditure shows a rise of Rs 12.733 billion to Rs 102.997 billion for 2008-09 as compared to Rs 90.264 billion revised budget of current fiscal year.
In addition, local governments' expenditures have been estimated at Rs 77.989 billion for the next fiscal year from Rs 73.598 billion, showing an increase of Rs 4.391 billion. For fiscal year 2008-09, public sector development program (PSDP) receipts are estimated at Rs 63.297 billion against total expenditures of Rs 77.31 billion. However, the receipts have been estimated Rs 14 billion higher than the current fiscal year.
PSDP receipts comprise Rs 6 billion carryover balance, Rs 37.715 billion provincial contribution, Rs 510 million DERA, Rs 4.355 billion foreign project assistance, Rs 2.008 billion under Sindh Cities Improvement Program and Rs 12.707 billion on account of other federal grants.
In his budget speech the Chief Minister said that education budget has been increased by 16 percent to Rs 19.5 billion from Rs 17 billion, while health budget has been raised to Rs 10.85 billion with an increase of 25 percent.
He said that Rs 5 billion would be provide by World Bank for distribution of free textbooks to over 5 million school students and Rs 609 million for scholarship for girl student from class 5 to 10. Presently, 50 thousands posts are vacant in different departments of Sindh and the government is also creating 8,000 new jobs in the police and other departments in next fiscal year, he said.
He said that government of Sindh is introducing health insurance scheme for the poor, under which 0.1 million household would be provided health insurance, in the first phase. A huge program for fighting Hepatitis with a cost of Rs 5 billion is being initiated.
Rs 200 million has been allocated for the rehabilitation of various health training institutions including Nursing and Paramedic Training Institute. The Chandka Medical College is being upgraded to university level and this would be renamed as Benazir Bhutto Shaheed Medical University.
In the next budget Rs 1.5-2 billion has been allocated for mass transit in Karachi and Rs 2 billion package for various schemes for Karachi, while Rs 200 million is budgeted for Lyari Expressway resettlement scheme, the CM said.
For raise in agricultural productivity, development budget has a hefty allocation of Rs 4.87 billion for agriculture sector including livestock and fisheries, he said. "Construction of small dams in Sindh is being initiated and government is taking up establishment of Nai Baran Dam on fast Track Basis," he added.
He said to encourage industrialisation the government intends to undertake revitalisation of Sukkur and Kotri Sites, which would be done by adopting Sundar Model of industrialisation where management and development companies would be found for improving infrastructure and taking care of maintenance of these estates. For this Rs 200 million has been allocated. "An amount for Rs one billion was already provided to four industrial states in Karachi including Korangi, North Karachi, Federal B Area and Northern By Pass" the chief minister said.