PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has spent only Rs3.8 billion on the Annual Development Program (ADP) projects in tribal belt during the current financial year.
According to sources in the finance department, due to the ongoing “cold war” between the federal and provincial governments, the province is facing serious financial difficulties and unable to fund ADP projects of the current financial year.
As many as, ten departments of the tribal districts – Hajj and Auqaf, Environment, Administration, Excise, Information department, Labour, Minerals, Population Welfare, Relief department and Tehsils – could not be provided any funds during the first quarter.
The KP government has allocated Rs99.11 bln for the tribal districts in the ADP for the current financial year, of which the finance department has released Rs26.5 bln but so far only Rs3.8 bln could be spent on the development projects being executed in tribal districts. The sources added that there was no punching of the funds of most of the projects due to which the work on these projects could not be initiated.
The provincial government allocated Rs2.7 bln for the agriculture department of which Rs1.1 billion were released till August. Under the National Finance Commission, the provincial government had set aside Rs34.6 bln for the tribal districts but not even a single penny could be released so far.
According to the documents, Rs121 million out of Rs262 million has been released for Hajj endowment, Rs198 million for the Board of Revenue, Rs1.4 billion for public health, Rs2.9 billion for the Department of Elementary Education, Rs1.2 billion for Power and Energy, Rs5 million for the Department of Environment and Rs10.4 million for the Department of Administration and Establishment have been released but these funds coulod not be spent yet.
Similarly, Rs11.4 million for Excise Department, Rs9 million for Finance Department, Rs35 million for Food Department, Rs134.2 million for Forest Department, Rs2.2 billion for Health Department, Rs661 million for Higher Education, Rs496.7 million for Interior Department, Rs22.5 million for industry, Rs602 million for industry, Rs32.3 million for information, Rs506.7 million for law department, rs276.5 million for local government, Rs2.4 billion for multi-sector development, Rs46.7 million for population welfare, Rs713.5 million for departmental relief, Rs6.5 billion for roads, Rs91.2 million for social welfare, Rs1.1 billion for sports tourism, youth affairs, and 43 million has been released for science and technology department.
Not even a single rupee could be released for the development projects of the tribal districts and Tehsil ADP. A total of Rs27 million has been released for the transport department, Rs1.3 billion for urban development, and Rs1.9 billion for the irrigation department. Efforts were made to take the views of provincial minister of Finance and health Taimur Khan Jhagra but he could not br contacted.
