September 03, 2008	Wednesday	Ramazan 2, 1429

LAHORE, Sept 2: The never-ending flour crisis on Tuesday claimed third scalp in the last five months when Food Secretary Iftikhar Ahmad Rao was shown the door. He followed Mr Seerat Asghar, who had 23-day stint at the job, when his predecessor Mr Ahmad Yar Khan was removed after the PML-N took over the provincial government.

However, the supply and price crises have persisted, stubbornly. The removal of Ahmad Yar Khan made sense, to some at least, due to the induction of new government in Punjab. Next change, however, shocked everybody out of wits because Mr Seerat Asghar had hardly settled in his seat when he was asked to leave.

Explaining the reasons behind the removal of Seerat Asghar, some insiders claimed he lost trust of the then de facto Chief Minister Mr Shabaz Sharif when he tried to point out some ‘contradictions’ in his procurement policy preferences.

The secretary reportedly tried to convince Shahbaz that increasing the procurement target by 500,000 tons hardly made any sense when actual crop yield had dropped by 1.5 million as compared to last year’s, and there was also no sense in projecting misleading federal figures. However, the argument failed to impress Mr Shahbaz Sharif. But situation did not spin out of hand, they said.

“The breaking point between the secretary and the then de facto chief executive came when the former was asked to charge sheet some of his officers, which he resisted because of lack of any evidence against them,” said an insider.

According to the secretary’s explanation, which he conveyed to his departmental colleagues, the CM wanted to create administrative scare though there was no evidence against those employees. The secretary was sent back to the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock.

The secretary was sent packing despite his pleas that he

was thrown directly into the procurement cauldron and was barely given time to settle down in his three-week old job.

The manner of throwing out Iftikhar Ahmad Rao is equally inexplicable, given his mandate (knocking the millers into line) and authority to do so. He was tasked to ensuring minimum flour price during Ramazan, which he did successfully – bringing the price to a record low.

From common man’s perspective, Rao’s success could be measured from the fact that he was able to bring down grinding charges by almost 75 per cent. Till a week ago, the Punjab government was paying millers Rs52 per 20Kg as grinding charges. Mr Rao managed to bring the charges down to Rs10 per 20Kg – a drop of Rs42 per 20Kg. He insisted that price of maida (fine flour), suji, choker and other by-products should also be included in millers’ profit and prepared a detailed profit plan of millers. He fought his case on the basis of those figure and out of total 630 flourmills in the Punjab around 350 agreed to the formula and started grinding flour.

The drop of Rs42 per 20kg naturally irked the “powerful and mighty” of Pakistan Flour Mills Association, who refused to lift wheat at the official price, and went on strike instead. Since most of these influential millers belonged to Lahore, their stoppage of grinding created supply crisis in the city. The secretary tried to meet it through, for the first time, releasing wheat to chakis (indigenous flour mills).

Interestingly, the provincial food minister, who held a press conference along with the secretary on Monday evening, effervescently defended the officer’s strategy and profit calculations and told the defaulting millers to either fall in line or face the music.

The minister’s tough stand, supporting the secretary, made it a straight fight between Rao and the influential millers. But, the millers’ late night meeting with the chief minister on Monday played the trick.