The Federal Ministry of Finance has released the fiscal operation report for the first nine months of the fiscal year 2025-26, according to which Pakistan’s budget has again gone into deficit.
The report states that from July 2025 to March 2026, the budget deficit was recorded at Rs 856 billion 360 million, while in the first half of the same fiscal year, the government received a surplus of Rs 541 billion 880 million.
According to the Ministry of Finance, the government’s total revenue during the nine months was more than Rs 14,799 billion, while the primary budget surplus was recorded at more than Rs 4,000 billion.
According to economists, the persistence of the primary surplus is a positive sign for the government’s fiscal policy, but the overall budget deficit shows that the pressure of interest payments and government spending remains.
Experts say that the upcoming budget will have to focus on increasing the tax net, limiting government spending and economic reforms so that the fiscal deficit does not increase further.
The report comes at a time when the government is trying to achieve fiscal targets under the IMF programme.