PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government rushed the Rs2.12 trillion budget for the upcoming fiscal year through the provincial assembly on Monday night amid an opposition boycott of the session against the speaker’s decision to disregard their cut motions about demands for grants for various departments.

The development came as a surprise to many as the PTI government had repeatedly announced that the budget would be passed only after the detained founder of the ruling party, Imran Khan, gave the go-ahead.

The Opposition resented the budget’s passage in a hurry and insisted that it had never happened.

During the budget session chaired by Speaker Babar Saleem Swati, the opposition members flayed the government for disregarding all their cut motions regarding demands for grants for various departments.

They pointed out that the massive Rs240 billion supplementary budget for the outgoing fiscal 2024-25 was the result of poor planning and a lack of interest on the part of the provincial government in the proper management of the province’s affairs.

Speaker disregards cut motions by members

Parliamentary leader of the opposition JUI-F Maulana Lutfur Rehman wondered why the budget was not approved as scheduled and why all cut motions of the opposition members were “bulldozed” by the speaker.

“There’s enough time for further debate on the budget,” he said.

Mr Rehman said that actually, the ruling PTI feared “receiving more directives about the budget passage,” so it got it passed in a hurry at night.

Member of the opposition PPP Ahmad Karim Kundi said that Monday night would be remembered as a “dark day” in the history of the assembly over the hasty budget passage.

“The government can’t be run through aggressive speeches of Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur,” he said.

Member of the opposition PML-N Arbab Mohammad Waseem asked the provincial government to reveal what forced it to approve the budget so abruptly.

He accused the provincial government of hoodwinking the residents and PTI workers through claims in the budget and insisted that it had nothing for people’s development.

Leader of the Opposition Dr Ibadullah Khan noted that presenting such a massive supplementary budget exposed the incompetence of the PTI government.

He said that the government should inform the house and people about the reasons for coming up with such an additional budget.

The opposition leader alleged Rs200bn corruption in the province during the current year and said that the figure was highlighted by the auditor general in its report.

“Systematic corruption is openly happening in all departments. I regularly receive corruption reports and will lay them before the house soon,” he said.

Responding to the criticism of the opposition lawmaker, law minister Aftab Alam Khan claimed that the speaker of the assembly had legal authority to set aside the process for presenting cut motions for demands for grants and holding debate on them.

He pointed out that the opposition members had recorded their objections to the budget during the three-day general debate, so their criticism of the budget passage was uncalled-for.

The minister said that out of the total Rs240bn supplementary budget, Rs192bn was for the current expenditure and Rs47bn for the development sector.

He said that of the current expenditure allocations, Rs150bn wasn’t spent by the government and instead, it was “invested in debt management fund.”

The chair later put off the session until today (Wednesday) due to a lack of quorum.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2025