LAHORE: Punjab has developed a new mechanism for determining the prices of vegetables, fruits, greens, meat and milk, Special Assistant to Chief Minister Punjab on Food Safety Salma Butt said on Tuesday.
She was speaking at the second important meeting of the Price Control Council, jointly chaired by Punjab Agriculture Minister Ashiq Hussain Kirmani and Special Assistant to the Chief Minister for Food Safety and Consumer Protection Salma Butt.
Chairman PAMRA Malik Ahmad Saeed Khan, MPA Farzana Abbas, Director General Enforcement (Price) Imran Qureshi, DG PAMRA Zeeshan Nasrullah Ranjha, DG Livestock Dr Sajjad and other senior officers attended the meeting.
Salma Butt said the provision of food items to the public at affordable rates was the Punjab chief minister’s top priority. She said strict measures had been implemented to prevent fake inspection entries and to ensure the availability of food items at officially fixed prices while also improving the performance of price control magistrates.
She said changes had been introduced in the “Qeemat App”, making live location (geo-tagging) and uploading a selfie mandatory for magistrates while inspecting shops and grocery stores.
According to Salma Butt, price control magistrates have also been completely prohibited from conducting inspections between 10pm and 5am. The meeting also reviewed in detail the performance of 1,635 price control magistrates across Punjab. From 2023 to August 2026, millions of inspections were conducted across the province.
Fines amounting to tens of millions of rupees were imposed for overcharging and failure to display official rate lists, while thousands of arrests were made and several shops were sealed, according to the meeting.
Salma Butt said strict checking of the prices of naan, roti and chicken and cases of overcharging was continuing, with immediate action being taken against violations of the law. She said a proposal to restructure the appeal committee was under consideration under amendments to the securities and price control law. A period of 15 days had been fixed for filing appeals against the prices of essential commodities, she added.
The special assistant further said that tomato and potato prices had witnessed a record decline compared with the past. She said prices of sugar, flour, cooking oil, poultry and pulses had remained stable during the previous six months. She said that the price of onions had increased slightly due to the off-season in Punjab, while 64 per cent of the supply was continuing from Balochistan.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2026