KARACHI, March 2: A vigorous campaign would be launched against the mill-owners, wholesalers and retailers of atta No. 2.5 found charging a price higher than the rate notified by the city government.

The campaign includes raids on godowns and shops to ensure that atta was selling at the notified ex-mill rate of Rs12 and retail rate of Rs12.50 per kg. The city government is considering adopting the same strategy in the case of atta as was adopted recently to get milk prices curtailed.

It has pointed out that the upward trend in atta prices is beyond comprehension as there is no short supply of the commodity in the city. Mill-owners, wholesalers and retailers have already been warned of the action against anyone found indulged in profiteering.

A senior city government official told the millers and traders who attended a meeting on Tuesday that consumers were being made to pay Rs16-18 as against the notified price of Rs12-13 per kg of atta which appeared to be an open violation of the relevant rules under which the provincial food department had fixed the ex-mill and retail rates.

According to sources privy to the meeting, the flour mill owners maintained that they were ready to sell atta at the fixed rates if provided with sufficient wheat quota.

The retailers' representatives told the meeting that they would also sell atta at the fixed rate provided they were supplied the commodity at the prescribed ex-mill rates.

Food Director Dr Tanveer Ahmed Qureishi said that his department would release 200,000 tons of wheat to flour millers in Sindh shortly. Out of this quantity, Karachi would have a share of 90,000 tons that would be sufficient for a smooth supply of atta to the local market.

He suggested that in order to ensure quality of atta, each atta bag should contain the production and expiry dates. This would also help curb hoarding, he added. Regard fine atta, it is learnt that a meeting would be held in a couple of days at the food department to fix its price.

Members of the Pakistan Flour Mills Association, Karachi Retail Grocers Group, Ration Merchants Association and Karachi Wholesale Grocers Group attended the meeting.

When contacted, EDO Raeesuddin Paracha, who had chaired the Tuesday meeting, told this reporter that the government was reviewing the situation where atta was being sold at a rate higher than the official one. He confirmed that a strategy, similar to that adopted against milk sellers recently, was being considered to check atta prices.

SUGAR PRICES: The city government, realizing that the sugar prices had gone up from Rs18-20 per kg in October to Rs27-28 now, is of the view that the upward trend was apparently the result of hoarding and black-marketing.