PAKISTAN’S debt stock has grown exponentially in recent years. So have debt payments, putting pressure on the budget. With the government running an unsustainably high fiscal deficit that averaged 7.3pc of the economic output in the past five years, it is not surprising that the national debt has already surged to Rs78.9tr — including a domestic debt of Rs43.4tr and external loans of Rs32.9tr.The country is in a debt trap where it must borrow more to pay back its existing debt — domestic and external loans both. It is thus only natural for annual debt payments to also spike. For example, the authorities had anticipated debt servicing to jump to Rs7.3tr or almost 58pc of the budgeted expenditure for the ongoing fiscal. However, according to a report, they have now revised these estimates to Rs8.3tr.