Roti prices

In Punjab tandoor owners and workers are now being arrested for failing to observe the government’s rate list

Tandoors across the country are pushing back against provincial governments’ efforts to force them to keep prices low, with many nanbais saying the government-approved prices are below cost, meaning that the bakeries would lose money on every piece of bread sold. While prices have been set keeping local cost of living and affordability in mind, they are still generally too low to make a profit, or at least to make running the business worthwhile. This is especially true in Punjab, where, on the one hand, tandoor owners and workers are now being arrested for failing to observe the government’s rate list, and on the other, Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz and her father, former PM Nawaz Sharif, go on photo-ops to show how appreciative customers and workers at tandoors were with the new prices. At the same time, other parties have also tried to play politics on the issue, only to turn around and attempt their own Olympic-level gymnastics with regard to pricing and weight of bread.

But while the politicians bask in meticulously choreographed glory, remember that tandoors are almost always small businesses with low margins. Making them out to be villains for trying to make a nominal profit of, at worst, one or two extra rupees per roti, is a barefaced attempt to divert attention from the fact that the federal and provincial governments have failed to control inflation, or to prosecute the profiteering billionaires who own the farms and mills. Unfortunately, as most people know, these ultra-rich profiteers are also politically influential and have ties to every major political party, insulating them from legal action. If the government is so concerned about keeping bread prices down, it should earnestly look at a subsidy model that ensures tandoors are cushioned from the now-constant price shocks caused by variable fuel and flour prices.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 18^th, 2024.

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