Presenting the budget in the National Assembly or lower house of parliament, Dar said,”The defence budget is being increased from Rs 780 billion for the outgoing fiscal year to Rs 860 billion for the year 2016-17″.
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“This was the fourth budget presented by PML-N government”.
Fiscal Deficit target was set at 4.3 per cent which was 8.2 percent in 2012-13.
With a view to give further boost to industrial growth, the government has subjected import of machinery and raw material to 3% duty, which is lowest slab in the country.
The GDP growth rate of 4.7 per cent in the year to June 2016 was less than the government’s 5.5 per cent target, and a contraction in the agricultural sector this year meant many Pakistanis do not feel much better off.
The minister further said that price of urea fertiliser was brought down by Rs 250 a bag during the past few months, and now it was further reduced by Rs 400 a bag, adding that price of diammonium phosphate (DAP) area was also being reduced by Rs 300 per bag from the next month, July.
To promote the corporate sector, tax rate for it will be brought down to 31%.
Acknowledging that taxes on some of the items would affect the masses, the finance minister said that every effort had been made in the budget not to put additional burden of taxes on filers. “We will reach our target of Rs3.96t and wish to push the tax-to-GDP ratio to over 10% next year”.
Federal Minister for Finance and Economic Affairs Ishaq Dar in his post-budget news conference, yet again painted a rosy picture of government’s economic policies and claimed Pakistan is going to become Asian Tiger.
The Prime Minister further said the government did increase the allocations in social welfare cash grants programmes like BISP, to make sure that millions of poor people, regardless of their income, can have lives of dignity and break the shackles of poverty.
The minister announced 10 per cent capital gain tax on selling real estate within five years.
A total of Rs2bn has been set aside for the construction of a State Guest House, while Rs1.02bn has been allocated to the Climate Change Division under the PSDP. The government has made a decision to zero-rate the local supplies of textile, leather, carpets, surgical and sports sectors from July. Last year, the amount went up from Rs12,000 to Rs13,000.
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Market capitalisation has increased over the last four years, while the pending merger of all three stock exchanges was also settled.
