KMC Council passes Rs55b budget with majority
The Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) Council approved a budget of Rs55.28 billion for the fiscal year 2025-26, by a majority vote, during a session chaired by Mayor Karachi Murtaza Wahab. Deputy Mayor Salman Abdullah Murad and Municipal Commissioner Afzal Zaidi were also in attendance, along with other notable figures. For the first time in KMC's history, all council members were given the opportunity to participate in discussions and offer suggestions before the budget was passed.
Wahab stated that the new budget will open fresh avenues for the city's development and ensure equal treatment for all union committees. He reassured that the promises made to the people of Karachi would be fulfilled, emphasising that development funds had been allocated fairly across all areas. The mayor acknowledged input from both the treasury and opposition benches, noting that useful proposals had been presented for the improvement of the city's development projects. He also expressed hope that all elected representatives would support public welfare initiatives through mutual consultation.
Meanwhile, Parliamentary Leader Karamullah Waqasi appreciated the manner in which the budget was presented, allowing every member to express their views. He noted that development work was underway across 246 union committees, with 71% of the planned work completed. Further, Waqasi urged accountability in case of any corruption, and clarified that the Rs3 billion allocated for the K-IV water project had been provided by the federal government, not the city administration.
Separately, Council member Najmi Alam highlighted equal spending of the CLIP fund across towns, confirming that Rs20 million had been allocated to each union committee. He also pointed out that stormwater drains were clogged with plastic bags, proposing a ban on plastic use.
Deputy Parliamentary Leader Juman Darwan, stating that a budget reflects the performance of an institution, criticised the federal government for making promises to Karachi but failing in deliverance. He praised the KMC budget for addressing key urban challenges including sewerage, water supply, roads, and other critical sectors.
Following approval of the budget, the city council meeting was adjourned indefinitely.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Business Recorder
a day ago
- Business Recorder
Traders reject abrupt implementation of digital invoicing system
PESHAWAR: Traders and manufacturers rejected imposition of heavy penalties and declaring defaulters under section 25-A of the SRO-709 and abrupt implementation of digital invoicing system to integrate small and large scale businesses and industries in one go. Business community raised voices against the government and FBR for its unilateral policy and initiatives, especially the aforementioned new system through three different resolutions that were adopted unanimously during an awareness session on Digital Invoicing organised by Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry in collaboration with Federal Board of Revenue /PRAL (Pakistan Revenue Automation Private Limited) here in the chamber. The session was chaired by SCCI president Fazal Moqeem Khan. Senior vice president of the chamber Abdul Jalil Jan, member of the SCCI executive committee Adnan Nasir, Aftab Iqbal, Ashfaq Ahmad, Muhammad Nadeem Rauf, Sajjad Zaheer, former senior vice president Imran Khan Mohmand, carpet exporters Mazhar ul Haq, Atif Rasheed Khawaja, Afshan Khan, Sadder, Fazal e Wahid, Secretary General SCCI Muqtasid Ahsan, representatives, managers of various industries, business and importers and exporters were in attendance in a large number. The resolutions strongly denounced the imposition of Rs2Million to Rs3 Million penalties and declaring the business community defaulters over violation of not digitizing in digital invoicing system and imposing heavy penalties under the Section 25-A, and called it an attempt to discourage the business and industries and demanded immediate abolishment of the afore-stated section forthwith. Another resolution against S.R.O.709(I)/2025, stating that businesses and industries are unprepared technically and physically to adopt this new system abruptly, therefore, it is strongly called to give an extension into implementation of the new system for an indefinite period. In the third resolution, the business community suggested phase-wise and sector wise implementation of the new digital invoicing system, right from large-scale manufacturing industries to small businesses and traders. Traders and manufactures opposed the section 25-A that has made mandatory to electronically integrate their hardware and software with FBR's computerized system through a license integrator or PRAL and to issue invoices, which unable for them to adopt abruptly while keeping in inadequate digital infrastructure, particularly in underdeveloped and remote industrial zones, insufficient technical readiness among enterprises, especially SMEs, limited digital literacy and capacity, both at user and support levels. They viewed that FBR is not itself fully digitized. Business community furthermore pointed out that frequent downtime of FBR's IRIS services couldn't enable them to generate invoices in wake of inaccessibility of the system. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Business Recorder
2 days ago
- Business Recorder
Domestic consumers: Pakistan govt hikes gas fixed charges
ISLAMABAD: Federal government has approved increase in the fixed charges for domestic gas consumers of both gas companies (SNGPL/ SSGC) by Rs150 (protected) and Rs400 (non-protected) effective from July 1, 2025. With an average 10 percent tariff hike will applicable to the power sector, bulk consumers, and general industry (process). The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC), on Friday, approved the summary submitted by the Petroleum Division, seeking approval for a revised natural gas pricing structure for the fiscal year 2025–26. The ECC considered the proposed adjustments in energy sector tariffs and decided to maintain gas prices to protect household consumers with only fixed charges re-adjusted in domestic sector to recover the asset costs. It also allowed price of gas for bulk consumers, power plants operating on natural gas and industry to be increased by an average value of around 10 percent. SNGPL, SSGC: Weighted average price of imported RLNG cut slightly The committee approved a raise in gas tariff to bulk consumers from Rs2,900 per mmbtu to Rs3,075 per mmbtu. For power sector tariff has revised from Rs1,050 per mmbtu to Rs1,313 per mmbtu. For general industry (process) tariff was revised from Rs2,150 to Rs2,350 per mmbtu. The minimum bill for protected and non-protected consumer will be calculated at the first tariff slab of each category. Power tariff would also be stand revised for PPL's gas supply to Guddu, and Mari Energies' gas supply to Foundation Power. According to the summary submitted for consideration of ECC, it argues that only room to revise prices is available in the domestic sector slabs, wherein, a huge cross-subsidy is involved which is estimated at Rs168 billion per annum at current prices. Government is already engaged with IMF under the resilience sustainability facility to replace cross-subsidies with direct or budgeted subsides in commensuration with income levels of the domestic consumers under the BISP. As per the reform measure, the framework for replacing the cross-subsidy would be developed by June 2026 following the model being pursued by Power Division which is expected to be rolled out in 2027. Petroleum Division worked out option whereby revision in the gas tariff, as well as, fixed charge has been proposed; however, in order to lower the impact of price revision in domestic sector, the revision in bulk domestic, industry (process) and power sector, which is unchanged since February 2023, has also been approved. The revisions in gas tariff are estimated to meet Rs41 billion revenue deficit of SNGPL and it would also generate Rs31 billion surplus for SSGC which would be utilised to meet prior revenue shortfall of SSGC which are around Rs565 billion. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Express Tribune
2 days ago
- Express Tribune
JI riles provincial, federal govts for ignoring Karachi
Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) Karachi Ameer Monem Zafar stated that the federal, provincial and local government budget made it very clear that Karachi and Karachiites were the priority of none among the ruling parties. The JI leader expressed these views while addressing a post budget press briefing held at Idara Noor-e-Haq, the JI Karachi headquarters, on Friday. Speaking on the occasion, he said that the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) regime allocated just Rs37.44 billion for Karachi out of its budget of Rs3,451 billion -- a mere 1.1 per cent of the total budget. He demanded that at least Rs500 billion be allocated for development in Karachi. Similarly, he said, each town should be granted Rs2 billion and each union council should be granted Rs20 million. Talking about the budget by nine towns in Karachi run by the JI, he dubbed it health, education and people friendly budget. Detailing the budget in the nine towns, he said that Rs870 million were allocated for the education sector as compared to Rs520 million in the last fiscal year. He said that an amount of over Rs310.5 million was allocated for the health sector as compared to Rs160 million in the previous year.
