HYDERABAD, Sept 16: Leaders of flour-mill owners on Sunday accused officials of the food department of discrimination against chakki owners who did not grease their palm and expressed the fear that if the department failed to supply them wheat then the retail price of flour could go as high as Rs25 per kilogramme.

The president of the Hyderabad Atta Chakki Owners Social Welfare Association, Haji Nawab Ali, and office-bearers said at a news conference at the press club that the total wheat requirement of chakkis in the district was 85,000 bags per week while they were getting only 21,500 bags.

They said that they had to purchase 63,500 bags from the open market to meet the requirement. Wheat price in the open market had increased from Rs1,350 per bag (100 kg) to Rs1,600 a bag leading to rise in the prices of flour to Rs19 and Rs20 per kg, they said.

They said that 50 per cent of chakkis in the district had closed operations due to non-supply of wheat by food department while the remaining, too, risked being closed if they were not supplied wheat.

They said that 400,000 wheat bags were lying in godowns in Hyderabad and 600,000 bags were getting pockmarked in Bolhari godowns but the department was not supplying it to the mills.

There were 235 chakkis in Hyderabad and Matiari districts, which kept their grinding wheels moving throughout the year to provide nutritious flour to the general public who preferred chakki flour over the mill flour, they said.

The department was supplying wheat to only 552 out of 776 chakki units at the rate of 37 bags per unit though it was bound to supply 21,500 bags per week to 235 chakkis, they said.

Not a single bag was supplied to the chakkis over the first week of the current month and for the third week running, wheat quota had been discontinued for past three days, they complained.

The association leaders said that the department, on the other hand, was supplying 560 bags of wheat per unit to nine roller flour-mills in Hyderabad.

They had complained to the chief secretary, secretary for food and the DCO of Hyderabad and were still awaiting their response.

They said that the federal government had directed the food department to supply ample quantity of wheat to the roller flour-mills and chakkis but the officials concerned did not follow the directives.

Answering questions, they said that the department had withheld supply of wheat and officials concerned said that they were waiting for the policy and allocation of wheat to each chakki.

It was an irony that 2004-05 wheat crop of 149,000 bags was still lying in the godowns which had been seriously damaged. They had to pay Rs3,500 per truck as transportation charges for Bolhari godowns whereas the it cost them only Rs1,800 per truck in Hyderabad.

They maintained that rise in transportation charges had swelled price of flour and ridiculed authorities’ claim that the country had a bumper wheat crop this year.

To another question they said that the government rate of wheat was Rs1,215 per bag as against Rs1,600 per bag in the open market.

SCA: The Sindh Chamber of Agriculture (SCA) on Sunday expressed grave concern over increase in the price of wheat flour and said that the raise had made it extremely difficult for a poor man to arrange to make both ends meet.A meeting of the chamber demanded that the government should take effective steps to reduce wheat price and observed that the growers had sold their wheat at cheap rates therefore wheat flour should also be supplied to the general public at cheaper rates.

The meeting demanded that the Sindh government should fix the price of sugarcane for the current season at Rs75 per 40 kg and direct the mill owners to start crushing from Oct 1 as already announced by the government.

FLOUR STALLS: The food department had established 13 flour stalls at different places of the district where flour would be sold at cheaper rates, he said.