Responding to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s offer to share the country’s cash transfer programme with India, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Thursday said India’s stimulus package ‘is as large as the GDP of Pakistan.’
The response by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) came hours after Khan, in a series of tweets, offered to share with India Pakistan’s experience of implementing its “successful” cash transfer programme following reports of how poor people in India are battling poverty in view of the coronavirus lockdown.
In a online press briefing today, MEA spokesperson Anurag Srivastava said that “Pakistan would do well to recall that they have a debt problem which covers 90 per cent of their GDP. As far as India goes, our stimulus package is as large as the GDP of Pakistan.”
“Pakistan is better known for making cash transfers to bank accounts outside the country rather than giving to its own people. Clearly, Imran Khan needs a new set of advisers and better information,” MEA Spokesperson Anurag Srivastava said.
Taking to Twitter, Pakistan PM Imran Khan had earlier said he is ready to offer help and share Pakistan’s cash transfer program with India to help the country in tackling the ramifications of Covid-19 on the poor. Citing a report from The Express Tribune, he said that 34 per cent of households across India will not be able to survive for more than a week without aid assistance.
“Our govt successfully transferred Rs 120 billion in 9 weeks to over 10 million families in a transparent manner to deal with the Covid-19 fallout on the poor,” Khan further added.
Last month, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a Rs 20 lakh crore economic stimulus package for various key sectors to deal with the adverse impact of the pandemic.
