Will the real experts please stand up!

The Senate Standing Committee on Finance, it appears, is not content with the budgeted subsidy amount for power sector in the Federal Budget FY13. It wants the power subsidy sector for the upcoming fiscal to be half a trillion rupees - Rs.81 billion more than the revised amount in FY12. It is least likely that the government will address the committees recommendations in affirmative, but that the most important body of the countrys Upper House should come up with such a recommendation is in itself disappointing. Recall, that the power subsidy has been budgeted at Rs.185 billion for FY13; which the experts say, will be overrun as usual as power sector reforms have hardly taken shape. But for the Senates finance committee to come up with such a recommendation, when the countrys fiscal deficit is soaring, speaks volumes of the level of (non)seriousness amongst lawmakers. The argument goes that when the government can bear Rs.1 trillion of budget deficit, why can it bear another half a trillion rupees - as if, doling out such an amount takes no toll on the countrys economic structure. It appears that the lawmakers think that printing money is the solution to fund an ailing sector and it is ironic that there were no suggestions directed at power sector reforms. Another Senator commented that should the power sector get half a trillion rupees as subsidy, it will be recovered with higher economic activity generated due to electricity availability. Someone needs to tell the honourable members that the subsidy will not add to power generation; it would only be used to clear the dues of power producers and to keep tariffs lower than the generation cost. No wonder, Pakistans power sector stands where it does, as the people at the helm of affairs, by and large refuse to speak rationally. The Committee went on to adopt the recommendation for a subsidy worth Rs.500 billion for the power sector during FY13, to be financed through a reduction in current expenditure. That, however, has never been and will not be the case in the near future, as the government does not have enough room to curtail the current expenditure, given their nature. The axe has always fallen on development expenditure and the subsidy overrun by and large equals the reduction in development expenditure. Talking of standing committees, the website of the Upper House reads, "Usually these committees... attract specialised parliamentary talent or educational excellence relevant to their designation and thus form an excellence within the Senate". The Finance Committees member with the exception of Ishaq Dar, don seem to fit this picture. Its high time that lawmakers should stop playing to the galleries and adopt the more rational approach, rather than a populist one.