Federal budget will make white collared people a beggar:Ch Pervaiz Elahi

Lahore: Pakistan Muslim League (PML) senior central leader and former Deputy Prime Minister Ch Parvez Elahi has said that after studying all aspects and immediate impact of the Federal budget, it is proper to say that this is a budget which will make the poor people poorer and middle class people poor which will put begging bowl even in the hands of the white collared people what to talk about the poor, increase the problems and difficulties of the masses, poverty ratio will further go up with the wave of price hike.

Talking to media today, Ch Parvez Elahi said that it is a bitter fact that the budget figures have sent a wave of restlessness and worry among the masses, taxing the books and copies of the children amounts to discourage education while no relief has been given to the farmers also. He further said that the Finance Minister has proudly stated that the budget will not affect the poor and only privileged segments of the society will be affected by it. He questioned if great hike in the prices of atta, ghee, rice and milk is not the problem of the poor people then whose problem it is ? He said in the budget, tax net has not been broadened, farmer is the backbone of national economy in Pakistan but instead of giving relief in fertilizers, diesel and agricultural implements prices of tractors and electricity have been increased.

He said the govt should listen to the voice of the people that the budget has not come up to their expectations. He said everyone knows that under Article 25-A, provision of free and compulsory education is the responsibility of the State adding that he was proud of the fact that much before 18th Amendment enforcement Pakistan Muslim League had practically implemented this in 2005, children were provided with free books and stipends and thus an important step was taken towards created of literate and educated society, this budget has not only changed the direction of this journey, this tax proves how deep is the conspiracy is hostility towards education and stopping the way of knowledge and awareness.

Continuing, Ch Parvez Elahi said that the national budget is meant for creating facilities for the people and in running the national system but nobody has any facility from the new budget, the rulers do not realize that increased difficulties of the people will also create difficulties for the country and as such this budget can best be described not only anti-people but also anti-country federal budget. He said every govt concerned about the problems and difficulties of the people increases the salaries of the govt servants and wages of the workers in the new budget, keeping in view the increase in the prices of items during the last financial year but the anti-employees and anti-workers rulers who formed the govt after stealing the peoples mandate have not realized the problems of the segments of the society suffering from acute price hike and by raising the General Sales Tax (GST) and other measures have caused increase in prices of every item of the common man use.

Ch Parvez Elahi said that increase in the pension of the retired govt servants in the federal budget is nothing more than peanuts and from this meager increase, the retired poor employees cannot buy even essential medicines for themselves. He said the govt immediately started implementation of its proposal to increase GST and even prior to the formal approval of the budget, petroleum products prices increase notifications were issued which the Supreme Court not only declared unconstitutional and illegal but also taken some steps practically before the announcement of the budget.