PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Wednesday ordered the administration of Peshawar district to ramp up efforts to control ‘artificial’ hike of the prices of essential commodities and spare no profiteer and hoarder.

A bench consisting of Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Ijaz Anwar also directed Peshawar’s divisional commissioner Riaz Mehsud and other relevant officers to improve price control mechanism to ensure consistency in the crackdown on profiteers and hoarders.

It also told them to make sure that the prices of essential goods remain stable observing it has been observed that once the relevant magistrate or administrative officer leave a market, the shopkeepers arbitrarily increase the prices of essential items yet again.

The court had taken notice of the issue of ‘artificial’ price hike earlier in the current month and issued directives to the government for controlling rates of essential commodities in the holy month of Ramazan.

Asks Peshawar admin to improve price control mechanism

Besides the commissioner, Peshawar’s deputy commissioner Shafiullah Khan, additional advocates general Syed Sikandar Hayat Shah and Qaiser Ali Shah, the director (food) and other relevant officials turned up and produced reports about progress on the matter.

The commissioner said that following the court’s directives, he had ‘further activated’ his team at divisional level and regularly visited markets for price control.

He added that the deputy commissioners and other officers actively carried out action against profiteers and hoarders on a daily basis.

The deputy commissioner informed the court that the district administration had visited 69,000 shops, fined 293 shopkeepers over profiteering and collected Rs14 million fine during the last one month.

He said that the police registered FIRs in 291 cases of profiteering; 690 shops were sealed, and 11,500 shopkeepers were issued warnings for overcharging customers.

The bench observed that issuance of warnings won’t serve the purpose as no sooner had the magistrates or the administrative officer left the shops after issuing warnings, the shopkeepers resumed overcharging customers.

The bench observed that there should be a mechanism that even if the relevant officers were not present in markets, the shopkeepers should not have the courage to increase prices on their own.

The commissioner said that the district administration had taken strict measures against hoarders and profiteers and seized 28,000kg lemons from hoarders.

Answering a query from the bench about any ban imposed on transportation of wheat flour from Punjab, the commissioner said that the administration had no such information and there was no shortage of the commodity in the district.

He also informed the bench that certain shopkeepers sold essential commodities at the rates less than those fixed by the government.

The asked the commissioner to encourage such people by awarding them commendation certificates to inspire others.

During hearing, the chief justice observed that the artificial price hike had hit the people, especially the salaried and low-income ones, hard.

He added that the court didn’t want to unnecessarily affect anyone’s business but profiteers should be dealt with strictly and their business places should be sealed.

The bench later adjourned the hearing asking the district administration to produce progress reports on the matter during the next hearing.

Published in Dawn, April 28th, 2022