Development Spending: Govt Launches Portal For Public Scrutiny

Development Spending: Govt Launches Portal For Public Scrutiny
The planning and development ministry has launched a portal to enable the public to view the details of the development spending with a few clicks on their screens.

The digital platform – containing details of projects worth more than Rs1 trillion – has ben launched with the aim to bring more transparency into the process.

According to Adnan Rafiq, a member of the governance, innovation and reforms section of the ministry, the portal provides a heatmap of Pakistan with PSDP [Public Sector Development Programme] projects plotted on it.

"These can be filtered with respect to the location, sector, sponsoring ministry, and the approving forum," he said in a series of tweets on Saturday.

Rafiq added, "We hope this will be used for analyses leading to improved planning process."

Elaborating, he said each project is assigned a page that provides information such as the overview, aims and objectives, progress, funds allocated and released so far. Pictures and drone footage is also available where available. "PC1s of projects approved by ECNEC & CDWP are also provided."

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The official further said the complaints section allows citizens to provide feedback and bring any relevant information to ministry's notice that needs attention, adding the monitoring & evaluation section at the ministry will take appropriate action on these.

Concluding, he hoped the portal will help every rupee go further in terms of value for money, and help align the development spending more closely with the national needs.

"Also, citizens will be able to see how and where the taxpayer money is being spent, thus strengthening state-society relation," Rafiq said.

The development comes at a time when the country is grapping with the worst financial crisis. There have often been calls for bringing more transparency into spending to ensure every rupee is rightly spent.

It is hoped that the move would play a role in steering the country into the right direction as it struggles to pull itself out of its economic hardship.