Dozens of traders and commission agents from the New Fruits and Vegetables Market staged a protest demonstration on Wednesday against the Market Committee and provincial Agriculture Department. Members of Karachi (Wholesale) Fresh Fruits Merchants and Commission Agents Association (KWFA) gathered at Karachi Press Club and raised slogans like "Down with Market Committee", a semi-governmental institution that works under Sindh Agriculture Department.
They criticised the committee for unavailability of the vacant plot for "loose" commodities, absence of basic facilities like water and electricity, at the fruits and vegetables market and depriving the poor labourers of around 70 acres of land which was allocated in 2001 by the then government for the development of Labour Colony.
To record their anger the enraged traders rallied from the market through the Gulshan-e-Iqbal based office of the committee and then protested at the KPC. The protesters told the media that having grabbed at least 20 acres of the allocated land the committee wanted to grab the remaining 50 acres with connivance of "land mafia".
"The Market Committee is not giving possession of the Labour Colony land to the labourers working in the fruit mandi," Basher Agha, Deputy General Secretary of the market, told Business Recorder. He said the committee was collecting some 600 to 700 million rupees annually from the traders on account of market fee, without providing basic facilities like water, electricity, etc, to them.
He said that the market was in dire need for a parking lot for over 300 trucks that transport bulk fruits and vegetables into the mandi. The protesters also accused Ashfaq Soomro, Administrator of Market Committee, of plotting to allow the land grabbers to occupy the precious land of Labour Colony.
"The summary has been approved by Sindh Chief Minister; the chief secretary has also cleared it (the project); but nothing concrete is being done by the committee," Dr Nazim, President of Pak-Kashmir Welfare Trust, said. The protesters carried banners inscribed with appeals to President for early solution of residential problems of the labourers, materialisation of government's promise to auction the "open plot", etc.