KARACHI, June 13: The Pakistan People’s Party has rejected the government’s claim of improvement in the national economy, saying that inflation has plagued the country and is forcing people not only to commit suicide in sheer frustration but also to slaughter their dependents. A study conducted and released by the Bilawal House Media Cell shows that prices of all essential commodities had increased manifold, with rates of some articles having gone up by 328 per cent, between 1995 and 2005.

It said that owing to the government’s bad economic policy, inflation was increasing at a rate of over 11 per cent and the country was continuously facing a deficit in foreign trade.

Describing the policy as ‘biased’, it observed that the rich were getting richer and the poor poorer. It also noted that the level of poverty in Sindh and Balochistan was much higher than it was in the Punjab and NWFP.

The study said that one of the main reasons for the bad economic condition was that while there was a ban on recruitments in place, the government was retrenching hundreds of thousands of workers under various pretexts, like rightsizing and downsizing.

According to the study, people are faced with extreme economic pressure and it is evident from reports suggesting that some 12-18 people were committing suicide in the country every day. Some people have even resorted to slaughtering their children owing to poverty. It said that whenever the government wanted to get funds to pay for its wasteful expenditure, it increased fuel prices. This practice leads to increase in the prices of all commodities.

It criticized the government for not caring for citizens, saying that even many developed countries would grant subsidies to provide relief to consumers in the event of price hike, but in Pakistan, the government would only raise fuel prices and utilities tariffs time and again and doing nothing for affected people.

The report said that while the salaries were increased nominally, education made expensive. In this context, it referred to increase in fees of seven big universities by 400 per cent and education material approximately by 100 per cent. Besides, transport fares had also been increased by more than 100 per cent.

Along with the findings, the media cell has released the following list of commodities with their 1995-96 rates compared with their current rates and the increase in percentage.

Salt from Rs2.80 to Rs12 per kg (up 328%), rice from Rs11.27 to Rs45 per kg (up 299%), chicken from Rs40 to Rs127 per kg (up 217%), beef from Rs48 to Rs130 per kg (up 170%), wheat flour from Rs5.90 to Rs17 per kg (up 188 per cent), mutton from Rs91 to Rs240 per kg (up 163%), milk from Rs13.50 to Rs28 per litre (up 107%), tea from Rs120 to Rs240 per kg (up 100%), tomatoes from Rs14 to Rs35 per kg (150%), diesel from Rs10.66 to Rs29.14 per litre (up 173%), kerosene oil from Rs10.55 to Rs32 per litre (up 203%), yogurt from Rs17.50 to Rs40 per kg (up 128%) and ginger from Rs27.25 to Rs100 per kg (up 267%).