JI wants action against flour mafia

CHITRAL: The local activists of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), Lower Chitral chapter, on Sunday asked the government to take a stern action against the atta (wheat flour) mafia for allegedly fleecing the people and creating an artificial shortage of wheat flour in the district.

Addressing a press conference, JI district chief Maulana Jamshid Ahmad, Maulana Israruddin al-Hilal, Maulana Salamatullah, Hayatullah, Shujaul Haq Baig, Fazal Rabi Jan and others alleged that the flour mafia in connivance with the alleged officials of the Food Department and district administration had jacked up prices of atta and created an artificial shortage of staple commodity in the district. They said that the food shortage situation was going from bad to worse, which will trigger protests by people if corrective steps were not taken.

The speakers said that people of the district remained deprived of subsidized wheat flour owing to the conspiracy hatched by the officials of the Food Department and district administration. The JI activists criticized the provincial and federal governments for their inefficiency to provide essential commodities to the people at reasonable prices.

They said that the residents were being provided substandard flour by the mafia while flour from the wheat given under the government quota being smuggled out of Lower Chitral earn more profit. They suggested to the authorities concerned to store the subsidized flour at the government godown from where the commodity should be distributed among the people. The speakers asked the relevant authorities to put a halt to the alleged smuggling of flour and arrest the accused to prevent atta shortage in the district. The JI activists urged the provincial and federal governments to end the electricity loadshedding and complete all the water supply and road construction projects to facilitate the people.