Police raid wheat godowns, seize 30,000 bags

17 Oct, 2007

The Sindh government has raided wheat godowns in different cities of the province and seized about 30,000 bags of wheat, which were piled up by the hoarders, sources told Business Recorder. These raids were conducted following the directives of Chief justice of Pakistan.
Justice Iftikhar Muhammed Choudhry to the Sindh government and the police to take stern actions against the hoarders of wheat, sugar and edible oil to bring down soaring prices of the essential commodities. Taking sou motu action against the fast soaring prices of wheat and flour in the local market that crippled the purchasing power of the consumers, the Chief Justice of Pakistan the ordered the police to raid the wheat godowns and seize the hoarded commodity.
It may be recalled that during the last week of the holy month of Ramazan, the price of wheat was raised by Rs 1,000 per tonne from 15,000 per tonne to the peak level of Rs 16,000 per tonne. However, the police, along with magistrates, raided the wheat godowns in Shahdadpupur, Dadu, Larkana, Nawabshah, Sanghar and other wheat-growing areas of the province.
It is believed that the raiding parties have seized thousands of wheat bags stocked in these godowns. Sources said that police had arrested some hoarders and lodged first information reports (FIRs) against them for being involved in illegally hoarding wheat. However, no decision had yet been taken about the recovered stocks, said the sources.
Around 30,000 bags of 100-kilograms had been recovered from godowns located in various parts of interior Sindh and it was expected that the government would purchase this wheat on the official price, they said.
Sources said that the wheat exporters had also piled up huge wheat stocks in different parts of the city for the last three months. The sources further said the Sindh Food Department and the police were planing to take action against the wheat hoarders of Karachi, during the next couple of days.

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