KARACHI: The recent banking data released by the State Bank identifies rural population of Sindh as the poorest among all provinces except Balochistan.

The Statistical Bulletin-November 2017 issued by the State Bank provides urban and rural personal deposits of all provinces including Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), etc, till June 30. The province and region-wise personal banking deposits showed that the rural population of Sindh failed to compete with rural Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and AJK.

Balochistan is not considered a competitor since the population is much less than Sindh. Banking penetration is also less than other provinces in Balochistan.

However, rural Punjab emerged as the richest among all as personal deposits of rural population were over 54 per cent of the entire personal deposits of the country’s rural population. Total rural deposits of Pakistan were Rs823.68 billion, with the share of Punjab at Rs448.75bn.

Rural personal deposits in banks of KP were Rs138.6bn, second highest deposits shown in the Bulletin despite having less population than Sindh.

Sindh, being the second largest province of the country (population wise) and having a much better record for its urban population, provides a disappointing and discouraging picture of its rural population.

The personal banking deposits of rural population of Sindh were just Rs82.3bn till end June 2017 – in fact these dropped in the previous 6 months. The same deposits of rural Sindh were Rs89.8bn in December 2016. Either the deposits were consumed or shifted to urban Sindh.

Since those who rule Sindh mostly belong to rural Sindh, it is disappointing that they have failed to improve the economy of the rural population. Sindh government has been the target of critics over rural poverty and poor education and health facilities for the province.

Even rural AJK has a better picture than Sindh. The personal rural deposits of AJK till June 17 were Rs108.3bn.

Only Balochistan — which has very small population compared to Sindh and a victim of prolonged law and order situation — had lower rural personal deposits of Rs15.5bn.

Rural Sindh is rich in terms of agriculture as it produces cotton, wheat, rice, sugarcane, and livestock. It also produced 70pc natural gas in the country; and also has a large contribution in oil production. However, the benefits of these resources are not used for uplifting the lives of the rural population.

The province generates over 60pc revenue for the country and has a large share in the divisible pool of federal revenue but the revenue is apparently not managed skillfully for the benefits of the poor segment of the province.

Published in Dawn, November 11th, 2015