LAHORE: Pakistan’s first-ever budget of February 28, 1948 had a total outlay of Rs197.24 million with an estimated deficit of Rs28.72 million, whereas the size of current 2026–27 federal budget is Rs18.7 trillion, which shows how much have the country’s proposed expenditures grown during these 77 years, research shows.
It is imperative to note that during the 1970s, the Pakistani federal budget crossed the Rs10 billion mark during this decade due to post-1971 war restructuring and nationalization policies, the total federal outlays crossed the Rs1 trillion mark in the mid-2000s, touching the Rs2 trillion plus mark by the end of the decade, and then the budgetary sizes grew aggressively from roughly Rs3 trillion at the start of the decade to over Rs5 trillion by 2018.
Between 2020 and 2024, hyper-inflation, currency devaluation and soaring interest payments skyrocketed the budget outlays, pushing the 2023-2024 proposed expenditures close to Rs14.5 trillion.
