All Iron Merchants Association President Hammad Ponawala has said that prices of cement and steel bars have come down due to arrival of smuggling goods, reported 24NewsHD TV channel on Tuesday.

Hammad Ponawala said that these were not government steps which decreased prices of cement and steel bars in the market, but actually the smuggled goods brought the prices down. 

He maintained that due to dollar dearth and non-clearance of imported commodities, prices of steel have gone up too high.      Steel market hardships have increased manifold. The legal importers are in a fix due to arrival of smuggled goods. 

He said the prices have started decreasing. Ponawala said this decrease was not due to the measures taken by the government. Ponawala said smuggled items were cheaper and selling at low rates in market because no duty or tax was paid on these items. 

He demanded immediate government action against smuggling of steel. He was of the view that legal importers were paying sales tax, duty and other taxes and govt had to bear a big loss due to smuggling of steel. He said that in international market there was only 40-50 dollar per tonne increase in steel prices.

Reporter: Ashraf Khan