F.P. Report
KARACHI: The Sindh cabinet approved to award the project to the NRTC to procure the buses by December 2021 and invest Rs 3 billion on the development of infrastructure such as establishment of Depots and bus stops and operate the buses.
This was stated by Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah while presiding over a cabinet meeting here at CM House on Thursday.
The meeting was attended by all the provincial ministers, advisors, special assistants, chief secretary Mumtaz Shah, Chairperson P&D Shireen Narejo and concerned secretaries. The chief minister termed it good news for the people of the province, particularly of the city.
Minister Transport Awais Qadir shah told the cabinet that the chief minister has already allocated Rs8 billion in 2020-21 and Rs6.4 billion in 2021-22 for procurement of 250 Diesel Hybrid Electric Buses under Sindh Intra-district peoples Bus service Project for Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Larkano, Mirpurkhas and Shaheed Benazirabad.
Advisor to CM on Agriculture Manzoor Wassan told the cabinet that the federal government has approved subsidies to the farmers during Kharif crop 2021.
He added that fertilizers (DAP) for Rice and Cotton would be given at the rate of Rs1500 per acre in which the federal government would give 75 percent or Rs2.7 billion and the provincial government would share 25 percent or Rs902 million.
Similarly, subsidy on cotton and rice seed would be given at Rs.12,00 per acre and subsidy for white fly control would be Rs12,00 per acre.
Wassan said that the Board of Revenue (BoR) has collected the data of the farmers at taluka level and growers have been categorized in two slabs – 1 to 16 acres and 16 to 50 acres. He said that the Sindh Bank has designed an E-card and has furnished a list of designated branches for giving subsidies. He proposed to name the E-card as` Peoples Hari Card’ which the cabinet approved.
The Minister for Food department Mukesh Kumar Chawla told the cabinet that 33,917.41 tones of the wheat were lying in godowns of Naushehroferoze and Kashmore where the concerned food dept officers had stored the grain without approval of the department, therefore, NAB has sealed the godowns and is not allowing lifting of the wheat.
Chawla said that if the wheat was not lifted the grain would be infested with weevil. The cabinet authorized the minister of food to talk to the NAB and get the grain released.
The cabinet on the request of the local government allowed the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) to sign an MOU with the K-electric for collection of Conservancy and Fires Taxes through electricity bills. Administrator KMC Murtaza Wahab briefed the cabinet about the proposed collection of the taxes and said their rates would be reduced so that minimum burden could be imposed on the citizens.
He added that his objective was to strengthen the KMC financially.
The cabinet was told that to commemorate the commemoration of 70th Anniversary of Pak-China diplomatic relations the Sindh government has decided to declare Sister-province relationship between Sindh and Hubei province of China.
The cabinet approved Sister-City relationship between Karachi and Shenyang, Tianjin and Chongqing municipalities, Sister-city relationship between Badin and Sukkur with Kunming and Sister-relationship between Thatta and Zhanjiang.
The cabinet approved the development of Khan Chowrangi, Clifton as Pak-China friendship square.
The cabinet approved amendment in Rule-4 of the Fisheries Rules 1983 to increase time for validity of fishing license from one year to three years.
The cabinet approved an amendment in Education City Act 2013 to appoint Chairman Higher Education Commission Sindh as chairman education City Board in place of the chief minister who could not hold education city’s board meetings due to his busy schedule. Minister Energy Imtiaz Shaikh briefing the cabinet said that NTDC had submitted Indicative Generation capacity Expansion Plan (IGCEP)-2047 in April 2020 based on certain assumption sets but it was withdrawn on the objections raised by the NEPRA. He added that after a public hearing, NEPRA directed NTDC to update the plan.
