‘Inflation tsunami to break backbone of poor masses’

F.P. Report

KARACHI: President Karachi Chamber of Commerce & Industry (KCCI) Muhammad Idrees, while expressing deep concerns over across-the-board inflationary trend ahead of Ramazan ul Mubarak, appealed Chief Minister Sindh Syed Murad Ali Shah to immediately call a meeting of Price Control Committee so that effective strategies could be devised and stringent measures could be adopted to control the sky-rocketing prices of most of the household products and commodities.
“The situation desperately calls for strict action otherwise the ongoing inflation tsunami was going to break the backbone of the poor masses. We are fearing that Karachiites are going to face another severe wave of inflation as profiteers and hoarders have started their illegal activities to maximize profitability by raising prices and creating artificial shortages of various household products and commodities”, he added in a statement issued here on Monday.
President KCCI pointed out that prices of most of the household goods/ commodities have been raised by the profit-hungry shopkeepers who give an excuse that these have been raised due to exorbitant hike in petroleum prices and imposition of taxes but it was a well-known fact that taxes have not been imposed on all the household goods. “In addition to taking strenuous action against hoarders, the government must also take strictest action against profiteers who are fearlessly looting the poor masses due to weak mechanism for enforcement of rates”, he said, adding that there was a time when prices of various commodities were raised in months but nowadays, these were fearlessly being raised within a matter of days due to bad governance.
“Devising an effective price control mechanism carrying final rates along with profit margin of each and every single household product along with its uncompromisable implementation across-the-board has become inevitable so that the already perturbed and totally overburdened public could be provided some relief in the holy month of Ramazan”, he stressed.