LAHORE, Jan 15: The launch of the chief minister's subsidized atta scheme in the provincial metropolis has been delayed by a fortnight because of the failure of union council Nazims to furnish the lists of deserving families in their constituencies by Jan 1.
Location of flour sale points at long distances is an additional problem for the residents of rural areas. The Nazims of 17 union councils had not bothered to submit the name of even a single deserving family in their constituencies by Thursday. Most Nazims had submitted lists of 200 to 300 deserving families while some had furnished the lists of more than 500 families.
The city district government decided to go ahead with the distribution of food stamps even without the submission of the lists of deserving families and distributed 86,000 coupons for the purchase of flour at the subsidized rates among 133 union councils. On the average 500 coupons were provided to every union council. Even the UCs which had submitted the lists of less than 500 deserving families were provided 500 coupons.
As many as 17 union councils had not bothered to collect the coupons available even without furnishing the lists. Many union council secretaries coming to collect the coupons, particularly those from the rural areas, were criticizing the location of flour sales points at long distances because of nomination of two or three sales points in every constituency.
Union councils comprising a number of villages did not have even a single sales point in many areas. A union council secretary pointed put that the sale point was at a distance of 15 kilometres from a village in his constituency. The poor would have to walk the long distance for the procurement of the 20 kg atta bags. Those using transport for bringing the flour bag home would spend a sizable part of Rs30 subsidy on it on the transportation charges.
Each of the 150 union council Nazims was required to submit a list of 500 deserving families from his/her constituency along with the copies of the national identity cards of the heads for provision of food stamps for purchase of two 20 kg flour bags every month Rs30 below the prevailing market price under the Chief Minister's Sasta Atta Scheme scheduled to be implemented from Jan 1.
As many as 126,000 flour bags weighing 20 kg each are to be provided to deserving families in the city district every month. Every family will get one flour bag in a fortnight at subsidised price.
FLOUR MILLS: The All Pakistan Flour Mills Association protested against the threats being given to the flour mills owners by the food department official for continuing atta sales at the Sunday Bazars despite the cancellation of the wheat quota sanctioned for the purpose.
PFMA Chairman Liaquat Ali Khan and Adviser Bilal Sufi said in a statement that the food department should restore the Sunday Bazars wheat quota in case it wanted the mills to continue selling atta at the bazars.
They said that the mills would not sell flour at the Sunday Bazars without the restoration of the quota by Friday (today). Miller would stop work if the quota was not restored.