RECORDER REPORT

LAHORE: Punjab Finance Minister Mujtaba Shuja-ur-Rehman has said that Punjab government has reserved two billion rupees to achieve Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). He stated this while addressing the party workers here on Wednesday.

He said the Punjab government has provided record funds of 274 billion rupees to health and education sectors for imparting modern education to the students, which is 26.25 percent of the total budget of the province.

“People of rural and remote areas are also being provided treatment facilities through mobile health units and one billion rupees had been provided for this purpose,” he added.

According to him, 7.44 billion rupees will be spent for treatment facility and upgrade the hospitals during current financial year. Also, 600 million rupees had been reserved for dialysis facilities to the poor kidney patients. A huge amount of 8.25 billion rupees would be spent on the provision of free treatment and medicines to the poor and destitute in public sector hospitals of the province.

Shuja further said the Punjab government has distributed solar lamps among 200,000 students last year with a cost of 2.5 billion rupees under Ujala Programme. He also said during current fiscal year laptops and solar lamps are being distributed among the students on merit under a transparent system. “Terrorism and unemployment can be wiped out by promoting education and provision of jobs to the youth,” he added.

“There is a need to utilise national resources equitably for setting up of a peaceful society and to ensure economic prosperity whereas problems like corruption, nepotism and unemployment can be controlled through good governance and transparency. DFID has granted aid to the tune of 351 million rupees to construct 15,000 additional class rooms (one additional class room for each public sector school having deficient facilities).