ISLAMABAD: The government on Tuesday managed to get the Finance Bill 2021, generally known as the federal budget, passed in the National Assembly with comfort as the opposition, which was without its leader Shehbaz Sharif, failed to put up any resistance.

A confident-looking Prime Minister Imran Khan attended the proceedings for only 50 minutes and left the assembly hall even before final vote on the budget after realising that his presence was no more required in the house to ensure the presence of the treasury members who had clearly outnumbered the opposition.

The prime minister entered the assembly hall at a time when the chair had already ordered a headcount on the demand of the opposition on the motion moved by Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin to take up the finance bill for consideration and final vote. The motion was approved with 172-138 votes.

It is noteworthy that the number of votes — 172 — polled in support of the motion is exactly the minimum number of votes required by the prime minister to get a confidence vote from the 342-member house.

Motion on finance bill passed with 172-138 votes; Imran, Bilawal, Zardari attend session, Shehbaz missing

The party position in the lower of the parliament shows that the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and its allies have 179 members whereas the opposition parties have 163 members, which means that 25 opposition members were absent from the crucial proceedings. A majority of the absent members belonged to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) as the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) had ensured presence of its maximum members, claiming that only two of its MNAs were not able to attend the sitting.

PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and his father and former president Asif Zardari remained present in the house for most of the time whereas the absence of opposition leader and PML-N president Shehbaz Sharif was conspicuous.

Almost all PML-N members left the house when the budget was put for approval through voice vote whereas the PPP and Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam members remained present.

After electronic media highlighted the absence of Mr Sharif, PML-N information secretary Marriyum Aurangzeb took to the Twitter, saying that Mr Sharif could not attend the assembly session due to the funeral rites of his cousin Tariq Shafi who had died in Lahore.

Later in a statement, Ms Aurangzeb dispelled the impression that her party had facilitated the government in the passage of the budget.

She said the opposition was not in a position to prevent the passage of the budget even after ensuring full attendance. After the absence of Balochistan National Party-M chief Akhtar Mengal and lone member of the Jamaat Islami, she said, the opposition votes would have had no effect on the finance bill.

“Cheap political rhetoric is a futile exercise,” she said while responding to the criticism on her party over its role in the budget session. She said the opposition’s job was to point out flaws and shortcomings in the budget, adding that this was the first budget in the history of Pakistan in which significant changes had been made at the behest of the opposition and the government had to take so many “U-turns” over the proposed budget.

“More than 35 amendments, proposed by the opposition, have been made to 15 clauses of the finance bill,” she said while taking the credit of even those amendments which the finance minister had moved in line with the announcement he had made during his concluding speech of the general debate in the assembly on June 25.

“The opposition played its constitutional role in the best interest of the people,” Ms Aurangzeb said.

The only amendment moved by the opposition and that had been incorporated in the budget was the one moved by the PML-N’s Rana Qasim Noon regarding the issuance of travel vouchers to the members of the parliament and their family members instead of air tickets.

The highlight of the day was the presence of PPP stalwart Syed Khurshid Shah and independent MNA from erstwhile tribal areas Ali Wazir, who attended the sitting after issuance of their production orders by Speaker Asad Qaiser. Though, Mr Shah had been brought to the Parliament House to cast his vote at the time of Senate elections in March, he attended the assembly session after one year and nine months. He has been under the custody of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in an assets beyond the means case since September 2019.

Both Mr Shah and Mr Wazir got the opportunity to speak in the assembly. Mr Shah, however, confined his speech to the budget only and did not make any hostile political comments.

On the other hand, Mr Wazir mostly raised political issues and the chair once switched his mike off when he started talking about the alleged murder of former senator Usman Kakar.

Responding to the speeches of the opposition members before voting on the budget, Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin said for the first time in the 74-year history of the country, a government had presented a “roadmap” for betterment of the poor and poverty alleviation. The previous governments did not make any serious efforts to eradicate poverty.

Admitting that food inflation was high in the country, he said the only solution to current inflation was to increase agricultural production.

Mr Tarin said the previous governments had kept low allocations for agriculture sector which had led to decrease in agricultural production and the incumbent government had to even import wheat.

The minister said the government would spend Rs150 billion directly and indirectly in the agricultural sector, in addition to Rs12bn allocated for the sector in the budget, out of which Rs70bn would be spent on fertilizers and Rs30bn on pesticides in the forms of subsidies.

He crirticised the economic policies of the previous PML-N government, saying it had left liabilities, including current account deficit, external debt, circular debt and trade deficits, which led the incumbent government to go to the International Monetary Fund.

The finance minister refuted the opposition’s claim regarding imposition of indirect taxes in the budget.

Responding to the opposition’s criticism on the government’s move to empower the Federal Board of Revenue to arrest tax defaulters, Mr Tarin said they had already amended the bill and now he would himself head the committee that would have the powers to arrest only willful tax defaulters. He said they had acquired a list of 1.5 million potential tax payers and willful tax defaulters would not be spared at any cost.

Now there would be no tax on wheat flour and its by-products, cars of 1,000cc and below, milk, internet, short message service (SMS) and mobile phone sets being used by visually impaired persons. Similarly, the government has also withdrawn taxes on medical bills and provident fund of government employees. However, the amendment moved by the opposition members to remove 75 paisa tax on mobile phone calls exceeding five minutes was rejected by the government.

Bilawal’s objection

Later, speaking at a news conference, Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari alleged that the government had passed the budget “illegally” as the speaker had robbed the members of their votes. He said he had already written a letter to the speaker in this regard.

The PPP leader said when he challenged a voice vote on an important occasion, the speaker violated the rules and deprived him of his right.

“It is sad to say that the speaker has violated the sanctity of the parliament. Today’s budget approval is unconstitutional and illegal… If this mistake is not rectified, this budget will be illegal. This budget … is morally unconstitutional. We will take up this issue from Kashmir to Karachi,” he declared.

The PPP chairman said all his party members were present in the session and he would raise the issue of “incomplete number” of opposition with Shehbaz Sharif.

Published in Dawn, June 30th, 2021