More than Rs 3 lakh fine recovered during market checking in a week

But shoppers unhappy as essentials still sold at inflated prices

With no let up in skyrocketing prices of essentials in markets, the government has claimed to have inspected over 4000 establishments in the past one week and realised a fine to the tune of Rs over three lakh.

According to the documents available with the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), the Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs (FCS&CA) department during the market checking ahead of the Eid-ul-Adha, has recovered a fine of Rs 3,68,200 from norm violators. The fine has been recovered from 752 norm violators since July 01 till July 08.

The document prepared by the concerned department revealed that a fine of Rs 1, 78,300 has been realized in Srinagar district alone where 613 establishments have been inspected in this month till today and 163 among them were penalized.

Rs 47,100 have been recovered from Anantnag district while Rs 34600 and 32800 have been recovered from Kulgam and Baramulla districts respectively, the documents reveal.

The lowest fine of Rs 8100 has been recovered from Bandipora district, it added.

As per the document, on Friday (July 08), the department has realized a fine of Rs 85,300 from norm violators in Kashmir while Rs 37000 has been recovered from Srinagar district alone. It added that Rs 12000 and Rs 10100 have been recovered from Kulgam and Kupwara districts respectively.

A separate document prepared by the department revealed that no police complaint has been lodged in this month while a total of five establishments—two each in Srinagar and Anantnag and one in Pulwama have been sealed by the authorities.

However, the seizure as well as the fine comes at a time when the shoppers, who throng the markets to buy essentials for Eid, claimed that there is no respite from skyrocketing prices as everything available in the market including food stuff, mutton, chicken, bakery items, clothes as well as the sacrificial animals are being sold at the exorbitant rates.

“The poor cannot afford to buy the food stuff ahead of Eid. The rates have gone up and there seems no one to regulate the rates on the ground,” the shoppers said and appealed the concerned authorities to launch a massive drive in this regard to put an end to the open loot in the markets—(KNO)