KARACHI, Oct 7: Dropping yet another bombshell on harried consumers reeling from rocketing prices, a leading producer of tetra pack milk has increased the price of its one litre pack by Rs4 soon after Ramazan.

On the other hand, the prices of other food items such as pulses, poultry and fruit have seen no decline after the holy month.

The manufacturer of Milk Pak pushed up the one litre pack rate to Rs54 on Monday from Rs50, general-secretary of the Karachi Retail Grocers Group, Farid Qureishi, said, adding that others will follow suit.

He recalled that when Ramazan was only a month away, producers of tetra milk had increased the prices of their products by Rs2 on a litre pack from Aug 1, besides raising Rs2 and Re1 each on half and quarter packs.

He added that currently, only the Milk Pak company had announced the increase in one litre pack. He said that the company had not mentioned any reason for raising the prices.

In June 2005, the litre pack was available at Rs29. In March 2006, the price was increased to Rs36 followed by another hike, pushing it to Rs37 in Sept 2006. In Sept 2007, the producers had increased the rate to Rs44 from Rs42. However, the rate of Rs44 remained intact till February 2008.

It was assumed that the prices of tetra milk had been increased in August due to an increase in transport costs caused by rising diesel and petrol prices coupled with one per cent increase in the general sales tax to 16 from 15 per cent in the new budget.

The government had affected an increase of Rs3.50 per litre in the diesel price last month while the petrol price had been reduced by Rs5 a litre. The taxes and duties had been the same, but the company had passed the burden onto the consumers.

Tetra milk makers had been cashing in on the surging demand of packed milk in the last few years and had been frequently increasing its prices.

In Feb 2007, the city government had asked the multinational milk producers to furnish details of the cost incurred on their milk packs in order to prepare a policy to regulate its prices. The MNCs were also pressed for the printing of retail prices on the packs with the production and expiry dates. The retail price is still not printed on the packs, though the dates of manufacture and expiry are there. Even the district coordination officer had given 15 days to the producers to furnish details. Some producers gave the details while others ignored the orders.

The city government had made another effort in April to control the prices of tetra milk. The Enterprise and Investment Promotion (E&IP) department of the city government had asked the tetra milk producers to mention the law under which they fixed and regulated prices.

Besides, the CDGK also wanted to hold a meeting with them. Instead of a meeting, the tetra milk producers served a legal notice on the E&IP department, saying that the commodity did not come in the purview of essential commodities and the E&IP had no right to check its prices.

On the other hand, the city government has been striving to fix and regulate the prices of fresh milk. Despite fixing the retail price of Rs37 per litre for Ramazan and onwards, the retailers are openly charging Rs40-42 per litre.

In pulses, the retail rates had been unchanged after Ramazan as masoor sells at Rs120 per kg followed by Rs83 per kg for high quality gram pulse, Rs60 per kg for No 2 quality, Rs75 per kg for arhar pulse, Rs52 per kg for moong pulse and Rs60 per kg for maash pulse.

There has been no significant reduction in the prices of fruit after Ramazan.