Gilgit: Pakistan Tehreek Insaf (PTI) government in G-B presented a budget of more than Rs. 119.3 billion for the year 2022-23 in Gilgit-Baltistan Legislative Assembly (GBLA) on Monday.
The assembly session was presided over by deputy speaker GBLA Nazir Ahmad advocate whereas the budget was presented by Finance Minister G-B Javed Ali Manwa.
Presenting the budget, the finance minister G-B said Rs. 61.4 million have been proposed for non-development expenditure whereas Rs. 47.88 billion for development projects.
Manwa said the new budget would be Rs. 9 billion deficit budget. He proposed an increase in the price of wheat and electricity charges.
He said the minimum salary for contractual employees will be RS. 25000 while 15% increment will be given on basic salary of the government employees. Government employees with a grade above 20 will get a 25% increment on their basic salary.
In the new budget Rs. 2.5 billion and Rs. 1.76 billion have been proposed for the education and health sectors respectively.
Javed Ali Manwa said as part of the non-development budget, Rs. 5.50 billion, Rs. 2 billion, and Rs. 1.5 billion have been proposed for ‘service delivery’, ‘civil repair and maintenance work’, and ‘grant in aid’ respectively.
According to the finance minister, Rs. 0.765 billion, Rs. 2.251 billion, and 0.1748 billion have been proposed for ‘agriculture’, education, and wildlife/environment respectively.
Similarly, Rs. 0.1217 billion, Rs. 0.498 billion, Rs. 0.288 and more than Rs. 2 billion have been proposed for industries/minerals, food department, tourism/sports/culture, and power sector respectively.
According to Manwa, Rs. 5.54 billion and Rs. 0.653 billion have been proposed for construction and security institutions working on maintaining law and order.
