Austerity drive: Imran Khan cuts PM House expenses by 68 per cent

ISLAMABAD: The present government led by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has further reduced the expenses of Prime Minister (PM) House up to 68 per cent under its austerity measures, ARY News reported on Wednesday.

Imran Khan has fulfilled his promises for adopting austerity measures after making a record cut in PM House’s expenses by 68 per cent.

The expenses of staff and other expenditures of the PM House have visibly reduced from over Rs500 million to Rs310 during the last two years.

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It emerged that the numbers of employees at the PM House reduced to only 180 from 522, whereas, the present government spent Rs316 million so far during the two-year period as compared with the last year’s expenditures up to Rs509 million in 2018.

In a previous move, the PTI-led government had decided in January to abolish the discretionary powers of the president and the prime minister of holding camp offices as part of its austerity drive.

The government had decided to bring a constitutional amendment to curtail the powers of the president and the prime minister of holding camp offices.

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Last year on August 1, Prime Minister Imran Khan had set an example of austerity and simplicity during his visit to the United States (US) which visibly costs lesser as a visit of ahead of the state over expenditures of the national exchequer.

ARY News had obtained details of expenditures made during the visit of PM Khan to the US, which was compared with the visits of previous rulers including former president Asif Ali Zardari and former prime minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif.

The details had become an eye-opener for all as the previous visits by the then heads of the state had put a heavy financial burden on the national exchequer.