KARACHI: Over 2,000 sellers of daily use commodities such as vegetables, fruit and grocery items were on Wednesday fined for overpricing by the provincial authorities in an attempt to ensure price control during Ramazan as complaints against profiteering kept pouring in mainly from the urban parts of the province.

Official sources told Dawn that 600 shopkeepers, vendors and hawkers who were found selling daily food items at exorbitant prices were fined Rs845,900 across the province by the assistant commissioners and mukhtiarkars in exercise of magisterial powers assigned to them.

However, people in Karachi, where 244 daily use commodities’ sellers were fined for overpricing, said that the price of every vegetable and fruit was increased by the sellers who told them that they were getting the perishable food items at higher price from the wholesalers.

Price and Supply Minister Ismail Rahu told Dawn that strict action was being taken against the shopkeepers, vendors and hawkers for selling fruit, vegetables, meat, beef, chicken, flour, sugar and other edible items at the prices higher than those fixed by the authorities.

He said that he visited a Bachat Bazaar in Gulshan-i-Iqbal to check if the food items were being sold at the official rates. “We have taken all measures to ensure people are not overcharged,” he added.

The minister advised the people to purchase flour, sugar, vegetables, fruits and other grocery items at Bachat Bazaars, especially set up during Ramazan.

Meanwhile, the officials said that 289 profiteers were fined in Naushahro Feroze, 165 in Kandhkot, 165 in Qambar-Shahdadkot, 45 in Hyderabad and 107 in Larkana.

In Karachi, 244 profiteers were fined during a massive campaign to ensure strict control on the prices of daily use commodities, including fruit and vegetables.

Price control campaign

Official sources said that Karachi Commissioner Iftikhar Shallwani directed all deputy commissioners of the city to launch a price control campaign and take stern action against the profiteers in the city to ensure that people get food items, including fruit and vegetables, on the rate fixed by the city administration and the market committee of Sabzi Mandi.

They said that all deputy commissioners had formed special teams comprising assistant commissioners and mukhtiarkars to use their magisterial powers so that the food items were available to the common people at officially fixed prices.

The sources said that the ACs were themselves supervising the campaign as per directives of the commissioners.

They said that Mr Shallwani asked the deputy commissioners to monitor the campaign and review the performance of the officials concerned.

The sources said that he also directed the DCs to submit a performance report to the commissioner office for the review of performance of the officials concerned.

The sources said that the performance of the market committee was also being reviewed by the city administration on a day-to-day basis in the morning during Ramazan.

They said that Additional Commissioner Karachi-1 Ahmed Ali Qureshi visited the Sabzi Mandi early in the morning to monitor the process of fixing of prices of fruit and vegetables.

The sources said that ACK-1 submitted his report daily to the commissioner for improvement in performance of the market committee.

They said the commissioner also asked the market committee to ensure that the prices of fruits and vegetables were fixed reasonably in a transparent manner to achieve the objective of providing relief to the common people.

Published in Dawn, May 9th, 2019