LAHORE-On first day of the Assembly debate on Supplementary budget, amounting to Rs 87.436 billion, the opposition members termed it a sign of bad governance, while treasury members defended the excess expenditure giving clumsy reasons. The opposition members observed that tradition of supplementary budget should be done away by enforcing strict monitory discipline and comprehensive planning during formulation of the annual budget. Ehsanul Haq Naulatia of PPP opened the debate. He was of the view that supplementary budget was justified only in case of some contingency and unavoidable circumstances. He said it was reflective of governments mismanagement and inefficiency. Naulatia questioned allocation of funds for construction of Kalma Chowk in the supplementary budget, and asked the government to explain what compelled it to utilize funds on the project which had not been allocated in the current budget. He said expenditure on flood relief was quite understandable, but the one on Kalama Chowk was highly questionable. Dr. Musarrat Hassan, a PPP legislator elected on reserved seats, suggested monitory supervision by parliamentarians of government expenditure, especially the one expended on development schemes, to ensure just utilization of tax-payers money. She said it was time that supremacy of elected representatives be established over non-elected persons sitting in the government. Qaisar Magsi, Arifa Khalid Pervaiz, Sakina Shaheen and Sher Ali Gorchani of PML-N defended government spending in excess of the actual budget, though giving clumsy excuses. Qazi Ahmad Saeed of PML-F and Najmi Saleem of PPP and other members expressed their views over the annual budgetary estimates for the year 2011-12, already approved by the assembly. They did not discuss the supplementary budget statement currently under consideration in the assembly. It merits mentioning here that out of the total supplementary budget of Rs 87.436 billion, a huge sum of Rs 61.822 billion have been paid back to the federal government, as Punjab government had received this much amount from the centre in previous years in the form of domestic as well as foreign loans. The government spent Rs 7.80 billion under the head of pensions during 2010-11, while Rs 7.22 billion was expended under the head of Relief. Other departments which consumed major chuck of unapproved budget include: Irrigation and Reclamation (Rs 3.46 billion), Police (Rs 2.34 billion), Communications (Rs 1.87 billion), Civil Work (Rs 800 million), Agriculture (Rs 260.260 million), Industries (160 million) and Public Health (Rs 130 million). The government also spent Rs 610 million under the head of miscellaneous departments during the period.