July 23, 2008	Wednesday	Rajab 19, 1429

SUKKUR, July 22: People, including traders and consumers, have termed recent hike in fuel prices an anti-people action, an injustice and a conspiracy against the country and the democratic government.

They said during a survey conducted by this scribe on Tuesday that the storm of price hike, which the phenomenal rise in fuel prices would cause, would break the back of poor masses who had already been pushed far below poverty line by unbearable inflation.

President of Sukkur Small Traders Haji Mohammad Haroon Memon said the increase in fuel prices was a sheer injustice. The government should have instead given subsidy on petroleum products to bring some relief to people, he urged.

Religious leaders Mufti Mohammad Ibrahim Qadri and Musharraf Mehmood Qadri slammed the increase and termed it an anti-people action.

The present government had failed miserably to provide any relief to people, who had become disappointed in their tall claims and hollow promises, they said, adding, that the government had delivered nothing during its 100 days.

Mohammad Hanif Memon and Abdul Rehman Ansari said that the rulers should cut down on their royal expenses to be able to provide some relief to people with regards to daily-use commodities.

Majority of people who recorded their comments during the survey believed that the government had no interest in solving people’s problems. The only factor behind price hike was wrong policies, which had overburdened people with heavy weight of inflation, they said.

They said that on the one hand the rulers did not tire of visiting foreign countries, while on the other the poor had been deprived of even a single meal.

How could a man earning Rs5,000 to Rs8,000 a month afford Rs87 per litre petrol, they asked. The lower middle class people were compelled to sell their motorcycles, they said.

They said that people had pinned high hopes on PPP government but all their hopes had dashed to ground within first three months of the government and their hopes had turned into disappointment and frustration.

They said that the rising inflation would result in large-scale crimes and corruption for the government would be responsible.

Scores of Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam activists led by Maulana Abdul Haq Mahar and Qari Muneer Ahmed Banglani held a demonstration at Clock Tower in protest against record hike in fuel prices.

The leaders slammed the government for what they called “atrocity with people” and said that the government had given nothing to people but price hike and disappointment.

They demanded that the government cut prices of petroleum products by 50 per cent and demanded that the rulers slash their expenses and stop power loadshedding.