Finance Minister Ishaq Dar while responding to the PTI’s “white paper” on the coalition government’s performance said that the details provided were “factually incorrect”, claiming that the previous PTI-led government had increased the fiscal deficit to 7.9 percent during the fiscal year 2019 which the previous PML-N government had left at 5.8 percent.

“The comparisons are at times factually incorrect and devoid of economic context,” the finance minister said addressing a press conference alongside federal ministers, Ahsan Iqbal, Khurram Dastgir Khan, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Marriyam Aurangzeb, and Ayesha Ghaus Pasha in Islamabad on Wednesday.

The finance minister said that PTI’s statement that the economic growth during fiscal year 2018 plummeted to 1.5 percent and inflation rose to 10.5% was misleading as the economic growth was at 6.1 percent during the said fiscal year.

“Economic growth declined to 3.12% during the first year of PTI government,” Dar claimed and added Inflation in 2019 was 7.3 percent.

“The prices of medicines increased by 300 to 500 percent during the PTI government, and the prices of edibles also increased significantly.”

The finance czar clarified that when the PTI government assumed charge the policy rate was 7.5%. “It [policy rate] increased to 13.25% by 575 bps by July 2019,” Dar clarified and denied PTI claims of increase in the discount rate by 125 bps.

“PTI was claiming that if they win the election they will double the revenue collection in one year,” the finance minister said and added that the PTI-led government could not achieve the target during its 42-month tenure.

He said that the incumbent government collected Rs.3,000 billion in revenue in six months. “This year FBR [Federal Board of Revenue] has set a target of Rs.7,470 billion.”

Dar said that the country’s economy was developing rapidly during the previous tenure of PML-N government, while the fiscal deficit reached its peak during PTI-led government.

He said the economic situation since April 2022 was strongly influenced by the legacy that the new government got from the previous regime, hence what did the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) led government received that should be the denominator for comparison.

However, he said, this context was not seen in the PTI presentation while it had also ignored international economic situation, the commodities super-cycle, Russia-Ukraine war impacts and catastrophic floods in the country. He said that these realities should have been kept in mind for making a fair analysis.

He said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had predicted that one-third of the globe would be in serious recessional problems in the year 2023 and Pakistan was no exception. “The fund has projected the growth at 2.7 percent of GDP,” he added.

The finance minister claimed that the PTI during its tenure did nothing but criticise the previous government and had not allocated funds for the security operation against the terrorists as the PML-N did for Zarb-e-Azb and other security operations.