Senate body okays Finance Division’s budget proposal of Rs18.177 bn

ISLAMABAD, April 9 (APP):Senate Standing Committee on Finance, Revenue, and Economic Affairs Tuesday approved the budgetary proposals of the Finance Division to allocate Rs18.177 billion for various development projects of the ministry under Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) 2019-20.

The meeting was held here at the Parliament House under the chairmanship of Senator Farooq H Naik.

Earlier the committee expressed its displeasure over the non-availability of Secretary Finance Mohammad Younus Dagha, and Chairman of Federal Board of Revenue Dr Jahanzeb Khan saying that such attitude was not acceptable.

Discussing the agenda items, Senator Engineer Rukhsana Zuberi pointed out that the State Bank of Pakistan was not cooperating with the young free lancers who are earning foreign exchange reserves.

She said the government should allow such free lancers to open their accounts in different financial instruments including Paypal to ensure smooth and free of charge transfer of foreign remittances.

She also suggested the government to take special measures to increase the export of services in information technology, and software sectors which currently stands at US$ 1 billion, however this sector has the potential of over $5 billion in the country.

An official from ministry of finance informed the committee that the government had already taken such measures and now the free lancers young people of the country were receiving their foreign remittances through banking channels without an additional charges.
He said during last month, the country received $120 million through such remittances.

Moreover, he said in this regard the government was also planning to organize training sessions in various cities for the young free lancers to make them aware of receiving foreign remittances against their services.