PESHAWAR: President of Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Sherbaz Bilour expressed concern over frequent increase in power tariff and suspension of natural gas supply to industries by Feb 1.

In a statement issued here on Monday, Bilour severely criticized the government over price of electricity Rs 1.95 per unit, putting burden of Rs 200 billion on consumers and termed it as an incomprehensible, unjustifiable step of the government, which is not acceptable.

He voiced concern over a whopping increase in the country’s circular debts, which has almost touched Rs 2.4 trillion.

He furthermore criticized that owing to the ill-conceived policies of the government, the difference between supply and demand of electricity has been widening in the country.

He added that the government is running “high-cost” power plants instead of giving priority to the cheapest one, which was another reason behind the increasing prices of electricity.

SCCI chief went on to say that the government was unable to provide new power connections to nearly 3000 people, despite its tall claims of producing electricity in surplus. He added the frequent increase in electricity tariffs would escalate production cost of industries, besides the trading community would be unable to payout high electricity bills amid the prevalent Covid-19 situations.

Bilour asked the government to take steps for mitigating problems of the business community instead of further multiplying their miseries by enforcement of “anti-business” policies. He demanded the federal government to immediately withdraw the recent hike in electricity tariff and to ensure uninterrupted power supply to the industries in KP.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021