Pakistan, facing a cash crunch, proposed to increase the expenditure on the defense sector by 15.5 percent to Rs 1.8 lakh crore in the budget for the next financial year presented on Friday. Pakistan’s Shehbaz Sharif government, trying to prevent a possible payment default due to dwindling foreign reserves, presented a budget of Rs 14.4 lakh crore for the financial year 2023-24.
Presenting the budget in the National Assembly, the lower house of Parliament, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar said that a target of 3.5 percent growth rate has been set in the coming financial year. Dar said, “This budget should not be seen as an ‘election budget’. It should be seen as a ‘responsible budget’.”
Elections are going to be held in Pakistan this year amid political instability since the Imran Khan government was ousted in April last year. He said that Rs 1,804 billion has been proposed in the budget for the defense sector, which is 15.5 percent more than last year’s proposal of Rs 1,523 billion. Defense expenditure is about 1.7 percent of Pakistan’s gross domestic product (GDP).
The maximum provision of Rs 7,303 billion has been made in the budget for loan repayment. The Finance Minister said that the inflation target for the next financial year has been kept at 21 percent, while the budgetary deficit will be 6.54 percent of GDP.