LAHORE, Jan 17: Punjab Price Control Committee chairman Khwaja Tahir Zia has said the committee will arrange import of vegetables during the shortage to counter blackmarketing by private importers.

Presiding over a meeting here on Wednesday, he said the body had decided to import vegetables being imported and sold by the private sector at exorbitant rates. The government was also considering grant of subsidy to encourage cultivation of low production vegetables and planning introduction of tunnel technology for growing vegetables and increasing production of tomatoes, ginger, onions and garlic.

He said the committee had stopped interference of non-notified union council nazims and councillors in Sunday Bazaars. Those trying to interfere would be proceeded against. Stern action would also be taken against the officials refusing to register stallholders. The government was also installing digital price display boards at fruit and vegetable markets at a cost of Rs24 million.

The meeting was attended by district coordination officers of Bahawalnagar, Jhang, Jhelum, Khushab, Lodhran, Mandi Bahauddin, Nankana Sahib, Rajanpur, Sheikhupura, Sialkot and secretaries of market committees.

AUQAF: The Punjab Auqaf Department is spending Rs28 million per annum on the provision of free medical facilities to the people at one hospital and 15 dispensaries attached to shrines.

Briefing a delegation on the facilities here on Wednesday, provincial Auqaf Minister Sahibzada Saeedul Hasan said maximum free medical facilities were being offered in the city where the department was running a 95-bed hospital at Data Darbar and nine dispensaries at the shrines of Bibi Pakdaman, Hazrat Miran Husain Zanjani, Takia Lehri Shah, Hazrat Shah Abul Moali, Takia Kakezai, Shah Kamal and Masjid Wazir Khan.

Dispensaries had been set up at Pakpattan, Multan, Kot Mithan, Sialkot, Liaquatpur and Sargodha, he said.