LAHORE - The Punjab government has proposed allocation of Rs137.91 billion for health sector for remaining period of fiscal year 2018-19 against Rs128.364 billion during the last year.
The government has increased allocation for hospital services by 29 per cent and cut expenditures for health administration. Major chunk of the allocation, Rs111.63 billion, will be spent on hospital services, laying main focus on provision of free medicines, repair of dysfunctional equipment.
Allocation of Rs5.898 billion has been proposed for public health services as against Rs5.132 billion during the last fiscal year. Health administration faced major cut of Rs10.42 billion this year. Allocation of Rs20.382 billion has been proposed for health administration as against Rs30.74 billion during the last fiscal year. Under Annual Development Program, a hefty allocation of Rs10 billion has been proposed for Integrated Reproductive Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health (IRMNCH) program.
Dedicated mother and child health clinics will set up in selected cities. These centres will function under the supervision of medical colleges/teaching hospitals. Allocation of Rs4 billion has been proposed for launching Health Insurance Scheme. The Program will be launched in selected districts in the first phase and will be extended gradually to across the province. As many as Rs1.5 billion will be spent on revamping of 25 District Headquarter (DHQ) Hospitals, 100 Tehsil Headquarter (THQ) Hospitals and up-gradation of selected tertiary care hospitals in the province.
According to APP, the government claimed that the budget would dispel the negative effects of fiscal indiscipline, corruption and malpractices of the past government.
In his budget speech on the floor of Punjab Assembly, the fincance minister said that this budget would pave the way for real development and prosperity of the masses.
He mentioned that today, the government was faced with severe financial constraints just because of non-serious and ineffective policies of the past rulers, who preferred their hobby of 'ribbon cutting' over increasing debt burden, thinking that paying back heavy loans was not their headache but of the people, who faced the brunt of price-hike due to these borrowings. In the past, programmes were initiated in the name of mega projects, which were actually meant for personal publicity of the former rulers, he added.
For instance, he said, the claimant of 'public service' (PML-N government) had termed Orange Line Metro Train as their pride but the project had now become 'bone in the throat'. Former government declared that these would cost Rs 165 billion, contrary to the fact that the project seemed to be incomplete even having over Rs 250 billion expenses.
Hashim Jawan mentioned that priorities of the past rulers could be well judged from the fact that despite poor health services and educational facilities in the province, they allocated only Rs144 billion in the previous budget (2017-18) for important sectors of health and education. Now every Pakistani ask from the former rulers that why they had spent the tax money on mere 'cosmetic projects', he added.
He said that Punjab had always been considered as financially stable province but all at once, it faced with Rs 94 billion fiscal deficit, which, in fact, entailed a long tale of corruption, embezzlement and fiscal indiscipline committed by the former rulers. At the end of previous FY, the PML-N government's borrowings had surpassed the figure of Rs 1,100 billion, he maintained.
Exposing the Rs635 billion Annual Development Plan (ADP) in the FY 2017-18, he said that its actual utilization remained at Rs 411 billion while one-third of the past government's ADP was contained to the budget document only.
The minister said that on the request of federal government, an amount of Rs 148 billion had been allocated as surplus, keeping in view the severe financial crunch in the country, asserting that this amount would be retained with Punjab government and would be available in the next budget for development plan, for which a comprehensive strategy was being chalked out.