BAHAWALPUR Aug 29: Flour is reportedly being smuggled into the interior Sindh with the connivance of corrupt officials of food and police departments despite on inter-provincial ban on its movement imposed by the Punjab government.

The smuggling of flour is being carried out from Punjab's Kote Sabzal border in Rahim Yar Khan district and Sindh's Ghotki district. It is learnt that the latest attempt of flour smuggling was foiled near Sadiqabad on Saturday last.

A truck (TL-591) loaded with some 700 flour bags of Arif Flour Mills, Kalashah Kaku, was heading towards Karachi. A raiding team seized the flour bags and arrested driver Mushtaq Ahmed of Haroonabad.

Commission agents and influential landlords of Rahim Yar Khan, Bahawalpur, Bahawalnagar and DG Khan districts are earning heavy profits with the alleged connivance of food and police departments' officials.

They have already stocked huge quantity of wheat at Obaro with the help of local villagers. They load the stocked wheat in trucks, trailers and containers to transport the commodity to interior Sindh and Afghanistan through Sukkur and towns of Balochistan. The wheat is sold in some interior parts of Sindh at about Rs500 per 40kg while in Afghanistan it is disposed of at Rs600 per 40kg. - Correspondent