Budget 2020-21: Govt allocates Rs1,289 billion for defence
Last year, the government had announced a Rs1,152 billion defence budget, which was later on revised to Rs1,227 billion
ISLAMABAD: The government has proposed Rs1,289 billion for the defence budget for the year 2020-21, 5.1% more compared to last year’s revised defence estimates of Rs1,227 billion for the year 2019-20.
In dollar terms, the volume of the defence budget remains almost unchanged, with the proposed allocations standing at $7.8 billion for the year 2020-21. Last year's defence budget had totaled $7.6 billion dollars.
The proposed defence budget is 20.3% of total current expenditures of Rs6,344 billion for the upcoming fiscal year.
“We have given special emphasis to defence [...] and internal security,” Federal Minister for Industries and Production Hammad Azhar had said in his budget speech.
After the second straight year of restrained growth in defence spending, both Azhar and Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh have praised the armed forces for their cooperation in the austerity measures being undertaken by the government.
Out of the total defence budget, the major chunk of Rs1,286.1 billion is reserved for defence services and Rs2.9 billion is proposed to be allocated for defence administration.
The total defence allocations include Rs475 billion in employee-related expenses, Rs301 billion for operating expenses, Rs357 billion for physical assets, while Rs157 billion is proposed to be spent on civil works.
Last year’s budget was revised from Rs1,152 billion to Rs1,227 billion due to an increase in expenses on employees, physical assets and civil works.
The Indian government had in February last announced around a $66 billion defence budget, which was nearly nine times higher than Pakistan’s proposed defence allocations of $7.8 billion for the financial year 2020-21.