Prices skyrocketing, no cash in banks

CHITRAL, Oct 25: Due to unavailability of cash in different banks here, people of Chitral, especially government employees, suffered a lot and many of them said that could not buy any sacrificial animals to fulfill the religious obligation on Eidul Azha. Zafar Hayat, al local lawyer, said he visited the bank many times but his cheque was returned as there was no cash in the bank. As a result, he could not purchase a sacrificial animal. Inamullah, the manager of Bank Islami, told chitraltoday.net that the National Bank of Pakistan was responsible to supply cash to all the banks in the district. In this connection, when this correspondent contacted Zahirullah, the manager of the National Bank’s main branch, he said being a representative of State Bank of Pakistan it is a fact that “We are responsible for provision of cash to all banks but we got very less cash this time.” He said only200 million cash was provided to them from Peshawar out of which the NBP paid 90 million to Chitral Scouts, 40 million to Chitral police, 30 million each to our branches at Drosh and Booni and the remaining amount is disbursed to other banks. “We had demanded for enhancement of this amount from 200 to 500 million.” A man standing in front of National Bank alleged that the bank did not pay him the money his brother had sent from Saudi Arabia through the Western Union. On one hand there is no cash in banks but on the other shopkeepers here looted people as Eid approached. Customers in the bazaars said they wanted to purchase some items but the prices had gone out of their reach. Unfortunately the local administration has miserably failed to overcome hoardings, dearness in the market.—G.H. Farooqui]]>