LAHORE: Various quarters are suggesting the government give an option to those who benefited from the sugar export subsidy to return the money they secured to avert action against them, and the funds thus recovered be diverted to assistance of the coronavirus-hit people.

Former chairman of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry’s agriculture committee, Ahmed Jawad, proposed that the government give an option to the beneficiaries of the sugar subsidy that they avert legal action by depositing with the treasury the amount they had received.

“If a person has benefited from the subsidy, whether right or wrong, he should return it. Otherwise, the government should recover the money along with fines and other penalties such as disqualifying them from any future official schemes and concessions for industries and exporters.”

He demanded that officials of the forum that approved the subsidy for sugar export also be probed to fix responsibility if they violated any rules. He regretted that the sugar millers not only secured subsidy from the government coffers, but also benefited by hiking prices of the commodity in the local market by manipulating the market forces.

He said the investigators should also probe into allegations being levelled by certain people that the subsidy was claimed even without exporting the sugar consignments.

Mr Jawad also urged the Competition Commission of Pakistan to set standard operating procedures for the sugar businesses, as such facilities were not offered to sugar millers in any part of the world.

Supporting the suggestion, the PPP has demanded the government immediately recover the funds worth billions of rupees from the sugar barons and divert them towards the coronavirus fund.

Senior leaders Aslam Gill and Malik Usman proposed that the money be used for offering at least Rs10 million as compensation to the health, police and other department staff working as frontline soldiers in the fight against the virus. The relief package for those losing their lives in the fight should be equal irrespective of their grades or pay scales, they added.

Cautioning those involved in the scam to take the Federal Investigation Agency inquiry report as writing on the wall about their future, Tehreek-i-Istaqlal President Rehmat Khan Wardag said the government should follow Saudi Arabia where the corrupt were released on payment of the funds they had plundered.

He also demanded the government do away with the subsidies to check embezzlement of the public exchequer under various garbs.

Published in Dawn, April 6th, 2020