PM Gilani visits G-6 Sunday bazaar

Routine shoppers were inconvenienced and displeased with the blockades as the PM arrived and visited different stalls.

ISLAMABAD: The weekly Sunday bazaar in G-6 was not a regular fair. Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani paid a surprise visit to the bazaar during the later half of the day. He arrived at the bazaar at around 4pm and visited different fruits and vegetables stalls.

Later, while talking to the media he said the government was committed to control inflation. “Even though inflation is a global problem, the government is fully determined to control the issue of price-hike in the country,” he told the media.

Special arrangements were made for his visit and extra police officials were deployed both inside and outside the bazaar. Roads leading up to the Sunday fair were blocked and no one was allowed inside once the premier made his appearance.

People coming for their routine shopping were inconvenienced and displeased with the blockades.

Jalil Abbas, who lives in G-8, said he regularly comes to the bazaar to get vegetables but had to turn around due to the blockade.

Asma Bibi, another regular visitor of the Sunday bazaar in G-6, was sitting visibly annoyed in her car. “I have been waiting for more than an hour now but the police won’t let me through,” she told The Express Tribune.

Even people not headed for the bazaar were inconvenienced as major roads around the bazaar, including Khayaban-e-Suhardwardy and Municipal Road, were blocked for more than two hours.

Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Qamar Zaman Qaira and Chairperson Capital Development authority Imtiaz Inayat Elahi accompanied PM Gilani during his visit.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 27^th, 2010.