December 03, 2006	Sunday	Ziqa'ad 11, 1427

KARACHI, Dec 2: Despite clear instructions from the federal government to continue a price checking campaign after Ramazan, the city government has yet to pay any attention and ultimately consumers are suffering by paying higher prices for essential items.

After holding just one meeting with stakeholders and market players in the first week of November, in which traders had flatly refused to sell items at reduced rates, the city government has not convened any further meetings.

Top city government officials, who had magisterial powers, had promised soon after Ramazan to start campaign shortly, but they are yet to come in action for the rescue of general public.

It was also planned to initiate the campaign on those prices which had been fixed for Ramazan till the Enterprise and Investment Promotion Department of the city government came out with the new prices, but so far nothing could be done.

In the meeting, traders of various commodities had refused to sell items at Ramazan rates. They had asked the government to first ensure the supply of items at reduced rates.

A spokesman for the Karachi Retailers Grocers Group (KFRG) said the city government had not contacted the group for any further meeting after the first meeting in early November.

Karachi Wholesale Grocers Association (KWGA) Chairman Anis Majeed said that after the first meeting traders were not invited for any further meeting. He said the association had already informed the Sindh governor and chief minister that price checking on monthly basis would not work as Karachi was not a producing city of any commodity.“Traders depend on imported commodities and arrivals from the producing areas of Punjab and Sindh. So there is a need to fix the price at the producing stage first and then touch the wholesale market.”

However, the prices of pulses and sugar have declined by Rs4-5 and Rs3 per kg, respectively, in the last one month without any campaign. “The government should let the market to follow its old mechanism of demand and supply in which consumers will automatically get benefit,” Mr Majeed said, adding that there had been no campaign after Ramazan in any part of the country.

A senior official at the EDO E&IP office, who asked not to be named, tried to defend the delay in resuming the campaign after Ramazan. “Our officials and inspectors are daily taking market roundup, monitoring the rates and conducting market surveys to ascertain the price movements. This is sort of a silent campaign without imposing fines or sending dealers to jails.”

He said it was not true that the city government had been sitting idle after Ramazan and added that the main focus of the city government was to control prices of fresh milk, meat and kiryana items. He said the price list would be issued every month and the government would renew it after the consultation with stakeholders.

However, in the first meeting, the newly-appointed Executive District Officer (EDO) E&IP, Hassan Naqvi was willing to continue the campaign for the next one year on monthly basis and had asked the traders to continue selling commodities at old rates until the new price list was finalised.

The wholesalers of pulses and rice had been asked to provide data of imports, import invoices, local crop situation, etc., so that it could help in checking their rates, but they flatly refused to provide details asking the EDO to check the international market rates on his own with the help of customs and the local crop situation with the provincial and federal governments.

Meat merchants and fresh milk sellers denied selling at Ramazan rates, informing the EDO of difficulties in maintaining the old rates.

However, a three-member committee comprising government and consumers’ body representatives had been set up to monitor the animals’ price situation at the Cattle Mandi, but so far nothing had been done.

Some 157 people had been sent to jails for overcharging and fleecing consumers during Ramazan. A total of Rs10.31 million had been recovered as fine from 7,867 traders -- 2,368 fruit sellers (Rs1.56 million), 1,153 vegetable dealers (Rs625,880), 1,645 milk retailers (Rs4.73 million), 677 meat sellers (Rs1.24 million) and 1,670 grocery items sellers (Rs4.3 million).