‘Extra taxes’: Flour millers threaten to launch shutter-down strike

MANSEHRA: The flour millers on Saturday threatened to launch a complete shutter-down strike if extra taxes imposed in this year’s budget were not withdrawn immediately.

“Our provincial body has completed its consultative process to go on an indefinite strike if the government doesn’t withdraw the withholding tax and increase fixed charges on electricity bills,” Muhammad Bashir Awan, the president of the Flour Mills Association, told reporters here.

He said that follow-up meetings held in Hazara and the rest of the divisions across the province in light of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Flour Mills associations’ earlier decision were unanimous about closure of the mills if the federal government didn’t withdraw extra levies imposed on their business.

“Our fixed charges on electricity bills have been increased from Rs500 to Rs2,000. And if a mill used to pay its power utilities of Rs40,000 it now has to pay an extra amount of Rs20,000,” Awan said. He added that the federal government had also imposed a withholding tax of Rs42 on a 20kg flour bag, which may cause a hike in the price of the commodity in markets. “The millers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are under constant pressure due to the imposition of taxes,” Awan added.