‘Help Pakistani Kashmir bridge budget deficit’

ISLAMABAD - The federal government should help Pakistan-administered Kashmir bridge its budgetary deficit to retain the confidence of its people and make them feel they are an inalienable part of the country, an editorial in a leading Urdu daily said Sunday.

“(Pakistani) Kashmir is “with us in every moment of joy or sadness and we should always strive to keep it happy and we should fulfil all its requirements,” the editorial in Nawa-i-Waqt said.

The Pakistan-administered Kashmir government Friday presented a (Pakistani) Rs.47.332 billion budget for 2010-11 with a record deficit of more than Rs.17.6050 billion.

“For the financial year 2010-11 (beginning July 1), Azad Kashmir government presented a budget of Rs.47 arab, 33 crore, 21 lakh, 15 thousand (Rs.47,33,21,015,000) which also will entail increasing the salaries and pensions of employees to federal levels. A sum of Rs.1 arab (Rs.1 billion) has been allocated to increase the salaries of police and judicial officers to levels of their counterparts in Punjab province,” the editorial said, adding the budget urged Islamabad to help it bridge Rs.12 billion of the total deficit.

It urged the federal government to provide Pakistani Kashmir a much greater share of the revenue it generates, while the Punjab government should help it with more than the assistance it promised so that a “feeling of alienation does not arise in their hearts”.

It was not “greed but support for the two-nation theory that drew Kashmiris to stand with Pakistan and this should not be forgotten”, the editorial said.