July 26, 2007	Thursday	Rajab 10, 1428

KARACHI, July 25: The city district government has delayed the issuance of retail price list of 66 items for July 18 to August 18. Besides, the officers responsible for price checking are barely visible in the markets allowing free hand to retailers to fleece consumers.

The CDGK had skipped the issuance of the list for May 15 to June 15 for which it had not cited any reasons.

A senior official in the city government told Dawn that preparation of the list had been in progress and would be released in a week’s time.

He, however, defended the performance of the officials in timely fixing the prices and later checking its implementation at the retail outlets.

The CDGK had been assigned the task of issuance of price list from the last Ramazan by the federal government on fortnightly or monthly basis to check profiteering and bringing stability in prices, but consumers have yet to see any benefit of this exercise.

Answering a question that the practice of fixing and checking prices had so far been unsuccessful in providing any safeguard to consumers against overcharging and profiteering, the city government official said that irrespective of the results “one thing is certain this effort has helped develop a data bank of price trends since the last Ramazan.”

This data would help in counter-checking of prices of previous months when traders and officials would meet next month for fixing rates for this Ramazan, he added. Previously, the price list had been prepared on the basis of rates prevailing in the market just 15 days ahead of the holy month. “This year it will be different,” he asserted.

As Ramazan approaches near, it is yet not clear how the city government will handle the price fixing issue with the market associations which have been rejecting these lists from the start of their issuance.

However, the official said that price checking campaign had been continuing without any hindrances and fines were being imposed on retailers of grocery items for violating the official price list.

On the other hand, the Revenue Department and its officials, who have been given magisterial powers to check prices and impose fines, have been doing their jobs half-heartedly leaving consumers at the mercy of market players.

The main focus of the city government has been on the fresh milk retailers since Ramazan last, but ultimately the consumers have been paying Rs2 to Rs4 per liter more since a legal battle on fixing price between the retailers and the CDGK is still going on at the High Court.

Kiryana traders have been divided over the procedure of fixing prices. As the Karachi Retail Grocers Group (KRGG) and Karachi Wholesalers Grocers Association (KWGA) have refused to provide any help in preparing and issuing price list, the city government has contacted another market association which is working on the new list.

The old market associations believe that it is impossible to issue price list on fortnightly and monthly basis as prices change on daily basis in view of demand and supply factors.

They said the city government had also published names of some of the market players and retailers, who have strong reservations over the whole price fixation process, in the price list without any understanding.