ISLAMABAD - Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday stressed upon the need for ensuring optimal and timely utilisation of funds allocated by the federal government under Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) and said that planning commission was eyes and ears of the Chief Executive.

He said this while chairing a meeting to review progress on PSDP here at Prime Minister Office. The meeting was attended by Minister for Planning Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar, Special Assisant to Prime Minister on Information and Broadcasting Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan and other senior officials.

The meeting was briefed that an amount of Rs 701 billion had been allocated under the PSDP during the Fiscal Year 2019-20 for development projects. It was informed that utmost efforts were being undertaken to eliminate delays in authorisation by the Planning Commission for ensuring seamless implementation of the approved projects.

The meeting was briefed on the detailed report prepared to assess the utilisation of the First Quarter releases by various ministries and divisions.

It was apprised that powers had been given to the Principal Accounting Officers (Secretaries of Ministries) for the release of funds for projects amounting less than Rs 2 billion to expedite progress on projects allocated to different Ministries.

Prime Minister Imran Khan while expressing concern over the under-utilisation of funds by various Ministries and divisions instructed the Planning Commission to come up with a monthly performance review report so as to determine the reasons behind the under-utilisation of the funds allocated for the vital PSDPs.

He stressed that unless all the PSDPs were executed timely, the wheels of the economy could not be turned.

The meeting also reviewed in detail the release of funds to various corporations and authorities, and satisfactory results of the block allocations to Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan.