BY OUR CORRESPONDENT
Lahore: In an attempt to stop sugar price hikes through the regulation of sugar mills in Punjab, the government has decided to declare all illegal activities carried out within the industry as “non-bailable crimes”.
To this end, the government has decided to amend the “Sugar Factories Control Act” for the first time in history. The move will empower the cane commissioner and deputy commissioner to collect arrears from sugar mills.
Per the proposed legal amendment, rigorous punishment is being increased from one year to three years if mills are found to be involved in delaying the issuance of sugarcane to farmers, making illegal cuts, carrying out inappropriate weightage, posing hindrances in offering accurate and timely information to the government, hoarding sugar stocks and selling it at prices higher than the ones fixed by the government.
Per the amendment, the maximum limit of penalty is being increased from Rs50,000 to Rs5,000,000 while the minimum penalty will be Rs1,000,000. Moreover, a minimum of Rs5,000,000 penalty will be imposed upon repeating the crime.
Sources have revealed that a draft of the proposed legal amendment has been sent to the law department for approval.
Meanwhile, the Pakistan Sugar Advisory Board (SAB) has dispatched recommendations to the federal government, wherein it has proposed to impose a ban on the export of sugar and reduce the general sales tax (GST) from 17% to 8%.
The Cane Commissioner Office of Punjab had intimated the government about the upcoming sugar shortage along with a price hike due to low sugarcane yield in October 2019. Despite that, the food department did not take timely action to mitigate the potential crisis.
Under the Sugar Act, all violations will be considered as non-bailable offences and a judge or magistrate empowered under Section 30 will hear the cases pertaining to the Act.-PUNA