September 25, 2008	Thursday	Ramazan 24, 1429

SUKKUR, Sept 24: In a rare show of solidarity, hundreds of traders and members of general public held a joint rally and a sit-in at Clock Tower on Wednesday in protest against what they called anti-people attitude of flour mill owners, who had forced people to run from pillar to post for getting the staple food item.

The protesters belonging to various trade bodies and general public led by the president of Sukkur Small Traders Sarwar Latif accused the flour mill owners and big wholesalers of hoarding the commodity in order to sell it later at exorbitant price.

They said that the flourmill owners were blackmailing the government and people by closing down flourmills forcing people to scramble for wheat flour just days before Eid.

They said that the mills closure had rendered hundreds of employees jobless and deprived their children of Eid joys. The flour mill owners were selling wheat flour to big wholesalers of Balochistan at the cost of local market, they alleged.

When the vigilance committees of food department raided their mills and wanted to check their records they resorted to strike to put pressure on the government, they said.

They blamed the mill owners for raising prices of the staple food item and said demanded that the government take strict action against them and ensure that the wheat supplied to them was being supplied to local market in the shape of wheat flour.

Sources, meanwhile, disclosed that all the flourmills of the province would resume functioning from Thursday.