Calling Prime Minister Imran Khan ‘patron’ of mafias, Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Wednesday accused the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government of looting people by deliberately hiking prices of daily-use items, reported 24NewsHD TV channel. 

In a statement, Bilawal said it was becoming hard for low-income families to live in these circumstances. “Only food items have become 15.9 percent expensive under the PTI government,” he said.   

Bilawal said with an increase in sewing rates by 4.5 percent, common man was dilly-dallying whether to get new clothes for Eidul Fitr.   

Similarly, he said, raise in house rent by 9.3 percent amounted to forcing people from their homes and making them languish on footpaths.  “29 percent increase in the electricity tariff during the past one year is the height of ‘selected’ prime minister’s anti-people mindset. “What people can do now when prices of edibles have gone up by 15.9 percent?” he queried. 

“Mr. Prime Minister! People shiver when they think of preparing fruit chat with the fruits whose prices have soared by 25.9 percent,” he taunted.

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Bilawal further said that 67 percent mind-boggling hike in the price of tomatoes was enough to prove that the ‘selected’ prime minister was the chief of a mafia. “While on one hand, people are suffering on account of inflation under the nose of ‘selected’ government, PM Imran’s rich and wealthy friends are minting money by raising prices of essential items,” he alleged. 

PPP chairman said it was his party’s government in Sindh that had issued ‘Benazir Mazdoor Cards’ at the time when inflation was at its peak. “The Sindh government will now make the lives of around 0.6 million registered factory workers easier through the issuance of these cards, while unregistered factory workers, as well as those working in the fields and labourers, would be issued these cards in the second phase,” he said. 

Bilawal further said that in these times of inflation, medical grants would be given to the labourers through these cards. “Similarly, grants would be released to the workers under the Benazir Mazdoor Card so that they could bear the expenses of education of their children and marry them off,” PPP chairman said, and added, “Not only that, workers and labourers will get special concession in the housing schemes to be launched under these same cards.”

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Similarly, he said, if any labourer loses a limb in any accident, he or she will receive pension for lifetime. “And suppose if he or she dies in an accident, his or her spouse as well as other family members will get allowance so that they could live their remaining lives with honour and dignity,” he explained.     

PPP chairman said if the party came to power at Center in future, it would launch the scheme in the entire country. “We are the party of labourers. We were with the working class in the past, we are with the working class even today and will remain so in future as well,” he expressed the resolve.  

Reporter Usman Javed