Opposition protests in KP assembly budget session

PESHAWAR: Budget session of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government is underway, Finance Minister Taimur Saleem Jhagra is presenting the budget for the fiscal year 2019-20, ARY News reported.

The budget session is being chaired by Speaker Mushtaque Ghani.

Soon as the budget session of the assembly started, members of Pakistan People’s Party and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz started protesting by holding banners and placards.

According to the details, the provincial government likely to allocate Rs162bn for education, over Rs52bn for health, Rs235bn for the annual development project, Rs45bn for police and Rs45bn for local governments in the budget.

The government is likely to allocate Rs1.8bn for Billion Tree Tsunami project while Rs3bn would be reserved for mainstreaming the religious seminaries.

The provincial minister likely to announce a 10 per cent raise in salaries of government employees from BPS 1 – 16 and a five per cent increase for those in BPS 17-19.

Read More: KP’s budget to be presented on Tuesday

Earlier on June 13, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government had decided to present its budget for the fiscal year 2019-20 June 18 (today).

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Minister Shaukat Yousafzai had assured that the budget would be people-friendly.

In a statement, he had said the developmental budget was being increased. The information minister had said reduction in taxes had been proposed in the next budget. He had added that salaries of provincial ministers were also being decreased by ten percent in the next fiscal budget.