Development schemes: Chief minister tells depts to spend more

Officials say around 23% of the funds for the current fiscal year have been utilised.

KARACHI: As the tenure of the present government draws closer to its end, Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah has once again asked the planning and development department to complete all ongoing schemes by the end of February this year.

He met planning and development, as well as, finance officials at Chief Minister House, and directed them on Thursday to monitor all schemes carefully, including special packages and MPAs development programmes. He added that all agencies responsible for executing the plans must work closely with government departments. Qaim also said that funds should be allocated to the special schemes initiated by MNAs so that they could be completed early.

He asked the planning and development as well as finance departments to provide up-to-date reports and details to the information department so that brochures depicting the five-year performance and achievements of the government could be made public.



The officials told him that the development budget for the current fiscal year is Rs231 billion, but only Rs53.8 billion have been released and utilised. The details of the project were then discussed. Under special initiatives, an amount of Rs8,561million was allocated for water projects but so far only Rs2,218 million has been spent.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 4^th, 2013.