Tarin, Miftah battle it out on Twitter

Incumbent Finance Minister Miftah Ismail and his predecessor Shaukat Tarin on Wednesday became engaged in an interesting debate on Twitter on the ongoing economic situation in the country.

Tarin claimed that a 6% GDP growth in 2022 after a 5.71% growth in 2021 is a slap in the face of PDM [Pakistan Democratic Movement] who called them “selected and incompetent.”

Pakistan is all set to achieve a GDP growth in the range of approximately 6% for the current fiscal year mainly because of the improved contribution of industrial and services sectors.

It is estimated that the size of the economy might touch Rs63.8 trillion for the current fiscal year or it might cross it. This is because the nominal growth (GDP growth plus inflation) would be gone up by around 19 to 20% for the current fiscal year.

“Such performance after Covid is spectacular. Bravo leadership of [former] Prime Minister Imran khan and the PTI economic team. [The] PDM [is] now try[ing] to match our performance,” Tarin added.

In response, Miftah tweeted that “Shaukat bhai record budget deficits in all PTI years, uncontrollable current account deficit, rapidly declining reserves, one of the world’s fastest inflation are daily slaps to the budgets of ordinary Pakistanis that [your party] engineered”.

He reminded him that he at once stage had said “PTI did “beragharak” [made a ruin] of the economy”.

Read Tarin lists previous govt’s achievements

The fourth year of the PTI in power was awfully indistinguishable to its post-election economic performance. The PTI-led government staged a combative approach by stating that the economic outlook is not all bleak.

An example of this was when Reza Baqir, the former governor of the State Bank of Pakistan, spoke about how currency devaluation favoured the families of non-resident Pakistanis since it increased the quantum of money remitted into Pakistan in rupee terms.

It was not difficult to comprehend that Baqir was trying to put some logic to a sharp fall of the rupee against the US dollar.

The rupee was sharply losing its value against the US dollar and enkindling hike in the prices of imported commodities like petrol which was hitting a new peak every fortnight. Spike in the prices of products like petrol was regressive in nature since petrol as a percentage of income was highest for the population at the bottom of the pyramid. That was why each announcement of an increase is met with severe outrage. It further also had a trickle-down effect on many essential goods and services, crushing the backs of the poor.