Budget FY14: PM decides not to use full strength of 49 ministers, Dar says

ISLAMABAD: The Finance Minister, Ishaq Dar, during his budget speech on Wednesday said that Prime Minister had decided not to use the full strength of 49 ministers allowed under the constitution.

He said a program had also been started to reduce allocations for various offices.

In this regard expenditures of the prime minister office have been reduced from Rs725 million in the outgoing year to Rs396 million in the new fiscal year.

He said that other than obligatory expenditures of debt servicing‚ defense‚ pay and allowances of civil services and grant‚ there would be a 30 percent cut in all other expenditures in accordance with the announcement of the prime minister which would help save Rs40 billion.

He said under Ramazan package‚ the government was designing a comprehensive plan to provide relief to the people by reducing the prices of essential commodities through utility stores corporation.

An amount of Rs2 billion has been allocated in the budget for this purpose besides other additional efforts. (PPI)