Council of Social Welfare: Rs 6.5 m budget announced

Fourteenth meeting of Provincial Council of Social Welfare approves budget for the year 2010-11.

PESHAWAR: The fourteenth meeting of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Provincial Council of Social Welfare held here on Monday approved the budget for the year 2010-11. With Provincial Minister for Social Welfare and Women Development Sitara Ayaz chairing the meeting, details on the implementation of decisions taken in the last meeting of the council were presented. The meeting approved budget proposals to the tune of Rs6.484 million for the current financial year.

Addressing the meeting Provincial Minister for Social Welfare, Sitara Ayaz said that steps were being taken for the complete rehabilitation of drug addicts and a plan to establish a proper rehabilitation center which would work on scientific lines to rehabilitate them is in the works.

Stressing the need of streamlining the affairs of NGOs working in the province and improving their performance, the provincial minister directed the concerned authorities to prepare a mechanism to this effect in consultation with the NGOs so that they could improve their performance.

She said that after the devastating floods of 2010, the number of disabled and jobless people has increased substantially, and the social Welfare Department needs at least five thousand wheel chairs and sewing machines to help them become self-reliant. She has made a special request to the K-P Chief Minister to help the department meet the need, which has been honoured by the Chief Minister.

The Provincial Minister further said that the issue of devolving the affairs of the National Council of Social Welfare and Pakistan Baitul Mal to the province has been taken up with the federal government.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 8^th, 2011.