PUNJAB Cabinet at its meeting chaired by Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar on Tuesday approved the establishment of 337 Sahulat bazaars across the province to provide essential commodities to the people at subsidized rates.
Addressing the meeting, the CM said that Sahulat bazaars will benefit the people and more steps will be taken to facilitate the people.
Firstly, whilst appreciating the provincial government’s pro-people step, there should be no delay in the establishment of Sahulat bazaars and the focus should not be mere major cities but also small towns and villages.
It must also be ensured that quality products are made available at these bazaars and action be taken against those selling substandard items.
Price hike has really badly affected every segment of the society especially the salaried class and they are now looking towards the government to take concrete steps to address this problem.
Sahulat bazaars indeed are an important initiative which will definitely help stabilize the prices of commodities in the open market.
However what is really important is that supply of commodities is ensured to keep the prices under check.
Whenever there is a shortage of any item, its price will skyrocket. The same has been witnessed in the case of wheat flour, sugar and chicken.
The federal government is also considering building strategic reserves of food commodities to curb the menace of hoardings, artificial shortage of food commodities and practice of extra-profiteering. This definitely will take some time.
Hence, it is important that simultaneously a strict price control mechanism is devised under magistrates to bring to book those elements manipulating the market and robbing the pockets of poor consumers.
It will also be not realistic to think that the prices can be brought down to the level that they were three years ago.
Thus the solution lies in enhancing the purchasing power of the people. For this, the government should give major relief to the public sector employees by enhancing their salaries.
Then it must accelerate development spendings so that the people get livelihood opportunities in different sectors.
