The price hikes would increase unemployment as a result of the high cost of production and low demand. PHOTO: FILE
LAHORE:
The recent hike in the prices of petroleum and electricity has been challenged before the Lahore High Court as an unfair burden on the general public.
The petitioner, Advocate Mateenul Haq Chaudhry, said that the people were already suffering from a high rate of inflation and power cuts and price hike would add to their miseries.
He said that the government had increased the power tariff by 40 to 80 per cent for domestic consumers. “It is as if the government has dropped electricity and petrol bombs on the already-burdened masses,” he said.
The price hikes would increase unemployment as a result of the high cost of production and low demand. Businesses would pass on the additional cost of production to consumers already facing “hyperinflation”, he added.
He said that the power tariff had been increased, through the withdrawal of a Rs140 billion subsidy, in compliance with the terms of a loan from the International Monetary Fund.
On the same day that the government announced the raise in the price of petroleum products, the Indian government had reduced the price in view of the falling rates in the international market.
He asked the court to declare the price hike illegal and to suspend the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority’s notification in this regard till the petition is decided.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 2nd, 2013.
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