LAHORE: Punjab Finance Minister Mujtaba Shuja regrets that members of the provincial assembly did not take interest in the prebudget discussion as only 41 MPAs submitted their written proposals for the next budget.

Summing up three-day pre-budget debate in the Punjab Assembly on Monday, the minister said that over 350 proformas had been distributed to elicit lawmakers` proposals for the next budget but only 41 filled and submitted them.

It seemed that the MPAs thought that their proposals would not be incorporated in the budget but this impression was wrong, he said.

He said the new budget would be pro-investment and people-friendly.

He said the government had set a Rs1 trillion revenue collection target of which 50 per cent was achieved by Jan 31. He said that sofar 45pc of the development budget had been consumed and it would pick up pace during the remaining part of the financial year.

Earlier, opposition leader Ahmed Khan Bhachar said that the poor participation in the pre-budget debate depicted poor performance of the government which, he said, should share its priorities related to basic rights, health, agriculture, and education, etc. He regretted that the government was being misled about the cut in price-hike as rates of lentils, pulses, vegetables and meat had gone through the roof during the last one year.

Criticising various development schemes, he said that the expenses on their advertisement were almost equaltothebudgetallocatedforthe projects.

He termed law and order situation poor in the city as well as province and quoted the advocate general`s report that one woman was being raped every 15 minutes.

He disapproved of the setting upof CM camps in different cities and alleged that victimisation of PTI workers was going on unabated even through the nefarious PECA Act.

PTI MPA Rana Aftab lamented at corruption in society and flawed judicial system.

He said that none was giving attention to the 10 million out-ofschool children in Punjab. He talked of the poor law and order situation in his native town Faisalabad where, he said, he could not dare drive his car after sunset.

The opposition earlier protested before the speaker`s dais at the beginning of the proceedings.

They raised slogans in favour of their incarcerated leader Imran Khan and demanded his release.

The house unanimously adopted a resolution commending the holding of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Committee`s conference by the Punjab Assembly.

The chair then prorogued the sitting sine die.