LAHORE: Flour millers blame the food department for what they say creating hurdles in the smooth supply of the daily-use commodity to consumers, while a meeting of the industry has declared the ban on free movement of wheat and its products as a violation of the Constitution.

“Unwritten policies of the Punjab food department are making the uninterrupted supply of flour to consumers in various districts,” allege Progressive Flour Millers representatives Khaleeq Arshad and Majid Abdullah.

“Punjab has followed in the footsteps of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa food department by imposing an undeclared restriction on inter-district movement of non-subsidised flour and other wheat products as a result of which tens of millions of rupees of each flour mill has been stuck up in the market,” they claim, fearing a prolonged ban may disrupt market of these products.

On the other hand, the food department has announced that the mill that is supplying unsubsidised flour, fine and other products to the districts other than it is located in shall have to forgo its official subsidised wheat quota for the day of the supply otherwise it will face departmental action, they say.

Millers see ban on wheat movement against Constitution

They fear that the measure will lead to a shortage of supply of subsidised flour in the district the mill is located in and appealed to the authorities concerned to immediately withdraw the policy.

Meanwhile, a meeting of the executive committee of the Punjab chapter of the Pakistan Flour Mills demanded here on Tuesday that the provincial authorities should immediately remove the ban on inter-district movement of wheat and its products as it was against the Constitution that guarantees free movement of merchandise and doing business.

Attended by Chaudhry Iftikhar Matto, Asim Raza, Liaquat Ali Khan and others, it said that consumption of milled flour has increased even in certain rural areas of the country because wheat stored by the people was washed away during the recent floods.

Thus, the present official wheat quota was insufficient to meet the increased demand for flour and the government should increase the quota accordingly to preempt any shortage of the commodity in the country.

Published in Dawn, November 9th, 2022