Arrest of hoarders
The mist of astonishment and confusion enveloping the abnormal increase in the price of sugar last year is gradually clearing away. This will also make people understand why political parties, despite their differing viewpoints, join hands to resist greater measures for accountability. The FIA has arrested, in various cities of Punjab, a gang of hoarders and speculators who engineered the previous year’s artificial shortage of the commodity that led to a steep rise in its price. The agency claims that the gang is part of a powerful sugar mafia.
As a result of the skullduggery of the mafia bosses and their underlings, the price of sugar had jumped to Rs90 a kg from Rs70 within a short time. The mafia allegedly made a hefty gain of Rs110 billion through price manipulation and hoarding of the daily-use commodity. These unscrupulous elements also opened a large number of fake bank accounts to carry out the big transactions in pursuit of their huge profits. The gang members are said to be enjoying the backing of highly influential politicians who own big guar mills. The FIA laid its hands on the gang members through continued surveillance of mobile phones and other electronic gadgets they used in their nefarious activities. The agency will take action against the sugar mafia under the Anti-Money Laundering Act, which is aimed at putting an end to the mafia activities once and for all.
The government ordered a probe into the affairs of the sugar trade after the sharp rise in the price of the sweetener. The inquiry commission in its report claimed that prominent political families of the country largely benefited from the price gouging scandal accusing them of earning illegal profits of billions of rupees. They allegedly made an enormous amount of money through fraudulent means. Later, the FBR recovered Rs404 billion in taxes mills had evaded from 2015 to 2019. The realisation of the evaded taxes will bring into the state coffers the much-needed money to ease the country’s economic woes.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 26th, 2021.
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