Thread by @baqirsajjad

Here I look inside the defense budget - how much of the resources are being spent on it, where is most of the money going within defense sector & which service is getting what. And the money, which is separately going towards pensions of retired soldiers. dawn.com/news/1563187

Before, moving to next year, let's briefly look at past year. The military in 2019 said it was
forgoing usual hike bc of eco challenges & settled for raise of 4.74%, but by end of year it had overshot allocation by 6.33 per cent. In reality there was 11% raise in 2019/20 as well

The amount earmarked for defence sector this year is 17.68 per cent of the total govt expenditure planned for the next year & seen as a percentage of GDP its 2.82%. This means we are relatively spending more of our national resources on defense when compared with neighbours

Chinese budget as share of GDP is 1.9 per cent, India 2.4 per cent, and Iran 2.3 per cent. In case you are interested in Afghanistan its 1%.

In addition to the military budget, there is a separate allocation of Rs 369 billion for pension of soldiers under Pension head of govt's current expenses. Another Rs 111 billion has been apportioned for civilian pensioners from other parts of govt machinery.

Most of the defense budget goes into meeting personnel costs. Rs 475 billion has been earmarked for this purpose. There has been a nominal 5.6% raise under this head and lays to rest speculation that armed forces may get 20% pay raise

Interestingly the defense head receiving the biggest raise is civil works - a 26% increase. This head, which gets Rs 155.5 billion this year, is used for military's construction and building infrastructure maintenance projects.

Operating expenses and the head related to procurement would cumulatively get Rs 659 billion. There is over 13.5% raise in both heads

Share of Army and inter-services estab has, meanwhile, marginally grown in the defense pie.