KARACHI, May 4: Like last year, a large number of traders have rejected the federal government’s decision about shop closure at 8pm, saying they cannot sustain losses in peak hours which starts after sunset till 10pm in summer.
Last year in June, the Sindh government in a bid to overcome power crisis had issued orders on shop closure.
After a lot of agitation, the Sindh chief minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim extended the shop closure timings to 9pm last year.
The government had taken a decision on early closure of shops on a plea made by the KESC to save power and to address load-shedding problem.
Overall, the exercise proved futile in the sense that only electronic traders supported government’s move, while all others started pulling down shutters initially owing to fear of harassment, but later they reverted to their routine practice. Moreover, there was no letup from loadshedding during the day and night despite closure of shops at 8pm.
Moreover, owing to disturbance in original schedule, both shoppers and traders were seen striving hard to reach their homes which resulted in huge traffic jams.
In Karachi, traders usually pull up shutters after 10.30am and do a roaring business till night.
In some specific business areas, shops beam up with lights and chilled A/Cs, but it is another question as to how much they pay bills to the KESC or whether they were operating their business on kundas (illegal connections).
However, traders feel that closure of shops has nothing to do with loadshedding as KESC has its own internal problems.
It was noticed last year that all shops located inside the big regular markets completely violated the Sindh government’s orders and continued to operate their businesses till 12am.
Chairman, Tariq Road Trader Action Committee, Siddiq Memon, termed the decision one-sided and vowed to protest.
He said peak business hours get under way from 6pm in scorching heat and end after 10pm.
He said that the Tariq Road area had over 24,000 workers employed in 40 shopping centres and 45 bazaars and if the decision is imposed with full thrust, 10,000 workers will lose their jobs.
“We have asked the KESC MD that traders are ready to open shops two hours late in the morning, instead of closing shops at 8pm,” he said.
He urged the government to issue orders for observing weekly a holiday on Friday instead of Sunday for three months till the power crisis comes under control because only 30 per cent bazaars open on Sundays.
Last year the Tariq Road traders had initially started market closure by 8.45pm which led to traffic jams because this was the time when people used to return from their offices.
The chairman of the Alliance of Market Association (AMA), Atiq Mir, said that like last year 90 per cent of the traders were not in favour of closure of shops during peak hours of business as 30 to 40 per cent business actually takes place after 5pm.He said last year 40 per cent markets in the city lost Rs2 to 3 billion in terms of turnover from June 9 to June 24, 2006, owing to 50 per cent decline in their sales due to early shop closure. Karachi has an estimated 150,000-200,000 retail shops.
He said that keeping in view the experience of last year, the government should now ponder over move to check power thefts and distribution losses instead of ruining business activities.
He added that business had already suffered loss of Rs 40 billion in terms of sales during April owing to massive loadshedding. He said evening shopping culture cannot be changed overnight.
