KARACHI: Nazim orders milk sellers to follow official prices - Operation likely today
KARACHI, Feb 21: City Nazim Niamatullah Khan under Section 144 CrPC, ordered all milk sellers, wholesalers and retailers to refrain from selling milk at a higher price than the officially notified one in the limits of the City District Karachi
, with immediate effect for a period of seven days.
The nazim issued the order following reports that milk was being sold at a higher price of Rs28/30 per litre against the officially fixed price of Rs22 per litre. He noted that this illegal price of milk was causing unrest in public and creating public nuisance and was likely to cause serious breach of public peace and tranquillity, as there were sporadic instances of brawl and quarrel between milk sellers and consumers in different parts of the city.
Niamatullah Khan said he was convinced that unless such trend of selling of milk at higher price was controlled and prevented immediately, it was likely to cause serious breach of peace and threat to the public life, property and tranquillity.
The city government is likely to kick off an aggressive drive against the milk sellers, who are selling milk on inflated rates. According to Enterprise & Investment Promotion (EIP) and Price Control EDO Raisuddin Paracha it was decided to launch the drive to bring down the soaring milk prices on Monday, but due to the official holiday of the CDGK on Monday now the operation would be undertaken from Tuesday.
He further said that CDGK would finalize its action plan against profiteers on Tuesday, in a meeting called by DCO Karachi Fazlur Rehman. He said the city government was taking a prompt action, as it had received information that even now milk was being sold at Rs28 per litre in the city, despite Dairy Farmers Association's announcement to sell milk on the above price from March 1.
"Strict action will be taken against those who violates CDGK's warning not to sell milk above the fixed price. We will interject more price control teams to curb the said offense", he vowed.
On question about dispatching a summary to the provincial government to seek magisterial powers for the CDGK for controlling prices, he said no reply was yet received from the Sindh government in this regard.
The citizens are now looking towards the CDGK to control the prices of milk as the city nazim has already refrained, under Section 144 CrPC, milk sellers, wholesalers and retailers from selling milk at higher prices than the one notified officially, i.e. Rs22 per litre.
It may be remembered that a few days ago, in a newspaper statement, the CDGK had strictly warned the profiteers not to inflate the price of milk. It had warned of an iron hand to deal with the matter, but till now there was no such iron hand visible as the milk was still being sold at Rs28 per litre at North Karachi, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Nazimabad, New Karachi, Saddar and other parts of the city.
The situation had got worsened on 8th to 10th Muharram when some profiteers sold milk as high as Rs30-35 per litre, justifying the offense as "high demand of milk against its short supply".
A milk merchant in Khudadad Colony, when contacted, said on condition of anonymity that dairy farmers had supplied milk to retailers on higher prices during Muharram to earn more profit. -APP/PPI
