Bureaucracy ignoring budget proposals: panel to lodge complaint with Senate chief

A parliamentary panel on Wednesday decided to register a complaint with chairman Senate, saying that budget proposals forwarded by the committee are being ignored by the bureaucracy. The Senate Standing Committee on Planning, chaired by Senator Agha Shahzaib Khan Durrani, observed that various proposals forwarded by the members during the past several years have been constantly ignored by the government functionaries.
Serious complaint was lodged by Senator Talah Mehmood who said that several development schemes have been put forward by him since 2010 but they were never taken up. His point of view was strongly supported by Senator Usman Kakar and Senator Shibli Faraz who said that the only the bureaucracy is managing the development budget and there is no input from the parliamentarians.
"We should be clear over one thing why our budget recommendations are not being considered and if this tradition will not change then why we are wasting our time and theirs too," Senator Shibli Faraz said. It was decided with consensus that the committee will meet the chairman Senate to discuss the matter. "We need to have an internal meeting first and discuss the issue with chairman Senate to resolve the issue," noted the chairman of the committee.
The committee members also noted that there is no binding on the National Assembly to consider the recommendations of the Upper House while approving the budget. The committee also witnessed heated debate over allocation of Rs 24 billion for FATA against the recommendations of development projects worth Rs 40 for the tribal areas and the senators highlighted that it is against the core idea of FATA reforms.
Senator Sajjad Turi said, "Rs 1 trillion have been agreed for FATA reforms for next ten years and only Rs 10 billion have been allocated in this regard, besides there is no mention of uplifting the international highway going to Afghanistan while there is only one airport in FATA that has been closed for more than a decade - why is there no money for it in this budget?"
The committee decided to hold a separate meeting on development projects in FATA and directed the secretary planning to appear in the committee to explain who is making the decisions for accepting or dropping the development projects.