Business community endorses strike call by APTMA

RECORDER REPORT

FAISALABAD: Business community and more than 150 trade bodies of industrial city have endorsed the shutter down strike call given by the All Punjab Textile Mills Association, which will be observed on April 8.

The strike would call as a protest against increased prices of petroleum and Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), the traders organizations threaten government to hold mass protest and observe a black day if the increases were not withdrawn.

Talking to newsmen, Khuwaja Shahid Razzaq Sikka, President, Anjuman-e-Tajran City said that the downward revision in the prices of petroleum products terming it a cruel joke, while load-shedding of 18-20 hours is still going on and traders are facing so many difficulties to continue their business activities. We will intensify protests against the price hike, load shedding and lawlessness, while traders will go to any extent to get their basic rights, he added.

He announced that if government not pays any heed, then traders launched long march towards Islamabad. Repressive policies and unjust taxation is bleeding economy and masses white while rulers remained totally indifferent, he added.

In a press statement, Ch. Salamat Ali, Chief Coordinator and ex-Chairman, Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturing and Exporters Association, North Zone said that harsh policies and unilateral decisions are systematically destroying economy and yielding multiple crisis, while Value Added Textile Industry continue to reel in a crippling environment.

The fresh increase in fuel prices would affect the prices of daily commodities like Atta, petroleum products plus transport and utility bills, causing further inflation in the country.

He said that the infamous decisions of the government have left industrialists, exporters and business community dysfunctional and dejected while decelerated pace of progress.

Salamat Ali also rejected recent move of increasing wellhead gas prices on the pretext of luring investment in this sector which is deception. Rulers are plundering country, resources, masses and economy which have brought business community to the breaking point, he pointed out.