Rs44.5bn CDGK budget announced
By Azizullah Sharif
KARACHI: A Rs44.5 billion tax-free budget of the City District Government Karachi and a Rs26 billion budget of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board for the financial year 2011-12 was announced on Wednesday.
The CDGK’s total receipts for the financial year are Rs24.8 billion, current receipts Rs23.5 billion and capital receipts over Rs1.2 billion as against its total estimated expenditure of Rs44.4 billion, indicating a nominal surplus of Rs102 million.
Presenting the CDGK budget for the next financial year in the seminar hall of the Civic Centre, Karachi Administrator Fazal-ur-Rehman told journalists that development and non-development expenditures had been slashed by 40 and 30 per cent, respectively. He explained that Rs32.71 billion had been allocated for development projects and Rs37.88 billion would be spent on the non-development sector.
He said a major chunk of Rs13 billion had been allocated for the education sector, followed by Rs11.8bn for works and services department, Rs5bn for health, Rs3bn for the annual development programme (district), Rs1.9bn for towns and union councils, Rs1.8bn for finance and planning, Rs1.5bn for coordination, Rs1.5bn for revenue and Rs1.3bn for municipal services department.
In addition, over Rs1 billion has been allocated for debt servicing, pension fund and miscellaneous expenditures, Rs563 million for community development department, Rs384 million for transport and communication, Rs347m for information technology, Rs305m for agriculture, Rs228m for the Karachi Mass Transit Cell, Rs221m for the master plan, Rs76m for naib nazim and council secretariat, Rs60m for the law department, Rs37m for the nazim secretariat, Rs36m for the enterprise and investment promotion department and Rs13m for the literacy department.
“In fact, the city’s development plans were affected in the outgoing financial year mainly due to discrepancies in the CDGK income and expenditures,” he said. He added that emphasis was put on the collection of taxes in the coming financial year. For this purpose, he said an exercise would be undertaken to review the income and expenses after every three months to avoid lapses of funds and ensuring their proper utilisation.
He said the monthly administrative expenditure of the city government had jumped from Rs480.7 million to Rs600 million in the wake of the Sindh government directives for increasing 50 per cent wages of employees.
He added the Sindh government had not increased the CDGK’s share of the octroi tax.
About the development projects initiated by former city nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal, he said: “All such development plans and mega projects are a source of inspiration for us and as such they are our priority.”
Highlighting the salient features of the budget 2011-12 at a separate briefing to the media, District Coordination Officer Mohammad Hussain Syed said that over Rs120 million had been allocated for the revival of the Karachi Circular Railway project while Rs2.6 billion had been allocated for the Tameer-i-Karachi Project.
He said Rs950 million for the citizen community board, Rs663m for development works at Korangi Scheme-23, Rs500m for joint venture projects, Rs434m for development works at Surjani Town Scheme-41, Rs416m for improvement and carpeting of Road-3100 from Road-2000 to Road-6000 and connecting roads at New Karachi Town, Rs379m for development of Scheme-36 (Gulistan-i-Jauhar), Rs360m for development of North Karachi Township, Rs300m for development and improvement of intercity, towns and union councils roads and intersections, Rs250m for special development projects, Rs250m for the construction of Orangi and Landhi cottage industrial area, Rs250m for the improvement of a patch of Manghopir Road, Rs213m for development works at Scheme-5 (Clifton), Rs209m for construction of 36-bed hospital/ maternity home at Sohrab Goth, Gulshan-i-Maymar, Gadap Town and Pathan Colony, SITE Town, Rs202m for the construction of car parking plaza at Shahabuddin market, adjacent to Empress Market, Rs200m for development works at Gulzar-i-Hijri, Rs180m for construction/ cleaning of storm-water drains, Rs180m for the Karachi Institute of Heart Diseases, Rs174m for upgrade of basic health centre to 36-bed hospital at Saeedabad’s Sector A-3, Rs150m for traffic corridor-III (Preedy Street, Jail Chowrangi, NIPA Bridge and Samama shopping mall) and Rs158m for improvement and rehabilitation of road from the Madinatul Hikmat roundabout to the Superhighway.
Source: Dawn
Date:6/30/2011
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