Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
Kia baat hay mashAllah… and aamins summa aamin 
Pakistan Zindabad
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
... I agree there are people involved in bijli-Chori, there are certain measures to avoid it... but govt is not ready to do so ! y coz that way the big theives cannot steel.. same applies in every aspect/sector ...
I being an engineer and lived in Karachi, tell you that there are other factors as well,
Types of Bijli chori:
- Chori (kunda system)
- Chori (illegal connections)
Chori (meter stoppage)
Power Loss:Due to bad and under gauge wire conductor
Due to improper joints between two conductor
Due to earth FAULT / leakage (bad insulators used)
Solution:
There is nothing impossible in this world!
KESC need to:
- Clean the wires on the regular basis (Copper oxide layer)
- Check the joints and connections, it should be tight and no air gap should be allowed to avoid any sparking which results in power loss!
- Use under ground power cables as much they can, these are concealed and protected wires, and have more life due to weather protection, and also are safe and concealed from the reach of thieves!
- Install meters out side the houses and industries to avoid stealing, and add some signaling system to send some signal if it was cracked!
- Measure the full load of the city again, as most of the illegal constructions resulted into more demand and less supply!
- Install new PMT after every 100 meters in the cities! NEW Power Plant: The mother of all solutions is to install a new power plant, it must be installed on the beach in the middle of the city to save the transmission line cost, and water can be taken from the sea for cooling! Use sui Gas Generators to reduce the price of Electricity! *Of course one and ultimate… Kala Bagh dam must be built soon… *
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
U r in Karachi and support Kalabagh?? pls escuse if I have failed to detect the sarcasm in that. 
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
Interesting analysis on the budget, which provided very little for the common man
Full article:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\06\11\story_11-6-2007_pg3_1
**EDITORIAL: **Why has the budget been ‘unanimously rejected’?
In routine Pakistani déjà vu, the opposition boycotted the budget session of the National Assembly on Saturday and treated the PML government to bitter vituperations on the electronic media outside the parliament.** Panning to the people at large, the TV channels found the man in the street distressed and angry.** And on business channels equipped with acceptable professional expertise for the first time, the captains of industry and commerce could only defend the budget at the risk of becoming unpopular. How unfortunate.
In other words, the government is throwing money at the coming elections. That the “utility stores” option has not worked in the past does not matter. All the subsidies, focused on the cities and farms, will add to the negative side of the economy in the future, but by then the elections would be over and the government will have another five years to tackle the “backlash” through politics. Judging from the current level of suffering of the people, the next tenure is actually going to be more difficult than the rulers imagine.
We all know that high growth rates in the third world produce the “poverty gap”, but Pakistan’s poverty gap has special features that should concentrate the minds of those who want to stay in power. Development outlays don’t tend to translate into development on the ground and most projects have to be shoved into future budgets; and the money remains unspent if not made to disappear. Meanwhile, infrastructure hardships keep mounting. In Karachi, for example, the negative view is clearly owed to what the citizens are going through during “load-shedding” and power breakdowns.
The most common plaint is that of a sharp decline in people’s buying power. Discounting for exaggeration provoked by the judicial crisis and the subsequent war with the media, the plaint that buying goods of common use has become difficult even for the middle class citizens is valid. This is partly the fallout from the policy of easy consumer credit of the past years. This is an explosive mix when counted with the increase in the number of “millionaires” in Pakistan.
The budget “concessions” will have little effect on the mood of the voter in the 2007 elections. Additionally the structural problems of the economy are expected to start impinging on the quality of life even more. Pakistan’s cotton economy is jeopardised by its non-competitiveness. The new minimum wage is only going to exacerbate the value-added sector which has already taken a beating from India and Bangladesh. Worldwide, higher prices will continue to bedevil efforts to subsidise food at home. The gradual death of state control over borders will bring in the factor of smuggling of goods that are cheaper in Pakistan than in the neighbouring region. Prices kept artificially low will subsidise populations elsewhere.
Internal political turmoil is bound to complicate the problems faced by the economy. No economy in the world can go on functioning normally while political instability grows and territories are lost to elements that defy the writ of the government. President Musharraf’s statement on the day of the budget, that he “will contest presidential election in uniform”, will hardly help. *
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
every reasonable man, is in favor of Kalabagh dam and every jahil is against kalabagh dam.
Budget - anwar azam khan
Hello!
What is ur opinion about the budget that recently has been announced. ?
Bela
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
I had read this the day after the budget announcement. had been meaning to share some comment on this.
http://www.dawn.com/2007/06/10/top3.htm
Winners only… no losers
By Afshan Subohi
KARACHI, June 9: The federal budget announced on Saturday aims at sustaining the country’s robust economic growth that sidesteps reforms, such as clipping the quantum of subsidies as desired by development partners, the World Bank and sister organisations.
The Rs1,874 billion budget presented by Minister of State for Finance Omer Ayub Khan along with impressive growth numbers, reveals an economy that is buzzing even without a synchronised economic policy aimed at addressing disparities, increasing industrial and agricultural productivity and achieving millennium development goals.
** This budget is clearly an attempt by the government to lure the voting community that they have alienated over the past five years by pursuing policies that were more rewarding for the privileged. The economic survey released on Friday acknowledges the fact that the wedge between the rich and the poor has widened over the past few years.**
** One may call it populist, but the election-year budget is an appeal for votes, offering something to everyone from business to farming to middle to lower classes, seeking to disarm the opposition on the economic front.The common man’s too simple to understand the long-term cost of short-term one off gains.The budget offers immediate respite to the toiling masses, both urban workers and rural farmers to cope with the rising cost of living.**
A multi-billion rupee subsidy package was announced to ensure availability of essentials such as lintels, ghee, tea, sugar, etc. at utility stores at cheaper rates.
The minister also announced the decision to open 5,000 more utility stores that will also deal in essential medicines. The government will run utility trains to reach people living in the far-flung areas.
The rise in minimum wages, inclusion of contract workers in the welfare cover, provision of subsidy on seed and DAP, 25 per cent reduction in electricity rates for tubewells, etc are some other such measures.
An effort has also been made to woo the middle class that appears to have been influenced by the ongoing anti-government movement spearheaded by the legal fraternity and journalists. A number of measures have been announced to provide immediate relief and concessions such as 15 per cent increase in salaries of government employees and 15-20 per cent increase in pensions.
An interesting aspect of the budget is the fact that though the size of the outlay has been increased but no new taxes have been imposed to cover the extra expenses. Amazingly, there are winners and winners and no losers. This translates into the reality that no attempt has been made to carry out fiscal corrections.
The tax regime is regressive where people are not taxed according to their ability to pay. The ratio of direct to indirect taxes remains unchanged.
The budget highlights the inability and lack of vision and willingness of the ruling PML, to re-orient the policies to make them equitable, open and transparent, while aligning with the military that thrives on the status quo.
Whether the government will be able to honour the fiscal responsibility and debt limitation law is anybody’s guess.
All in all it’s a clever election-year budget but it’s a budget that fails a future test, and it fails the test in some key areas. It doesn’t deal in an effective way with infrastructural bottlenecks (acute shortages of water and power), speculative activity that is diverting precious resources to non-productive areas (real estate and stocks), provision of social security net and lifting and boosting productivity by investing appropriately in human capital.
Despite the massive spending spree, unless the supply side constraints especially in food items are removed, the trend of price rise cannot be arrested.
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
Like many politicized analyst this economist (if she is one; she does usually write well in Dawn EBR weekly) too accepts the positives of the budget, admits the improvements for which cries are raised for the poor every budget every year, BUT, calls it all election year campaigning, politically directed and even refuses to appreciate admittance that previous budgets were not as poor friendly, and this has been an improvement in certain areas.
But no. Seems what they mean is, if the previous budgets werent as good, no reason to make it more poor friendly now, it being an election year all has to have sinister motive. Ok. but talk abt politics, thats how it works!
And, most interesting was this comment;
"The common man’s too simple to understand the long-term cost of short-term one off gains."
Smart use of words.
Enough to confuse whoever is her 'common man' influenced by anti-govt sentiment of late.
Surprising how many economic analysts always failed to highlight or point out the 'short-term cost of long-term gains'!
Re: National Budget for fiscal year 2007-08
Nice, balanced article.