Wednesday, May 27, 2009

STRIKES, HOLIDAYS, POWER BREAKDOWNS

Traders demand Karachi be declared as ‘calamity-hit’ city

KARACHI: All Pakistan Organization of Small Traders and Cottage Industries has demanded of government to give a tax exemption to the traders of Karachi for two years by declaring Karachi a disaster-hit area to compensate huge loss of traders owing frequent strikes, holidays and prolonged load-shedding.
APOSTCI Karachi chapter president Mehmood Hamid, Vice Presidents Ansar Baig Qadri, Abdul Majid and Usman Sharif said traders bear a loss of Rs140 million due to one-day strike in Karachi.
They said 12 to 14 hours of load-shedding have not allowed them to properly run their business even on normal days. Load-shedding is worsening with every passing day in Karachi and people have now become psycho patients, they said.
Traders are facing sever losses, business centers are closed and citizens cannot have a proper sleep in night due to frequent and prolong outages of electricity by the KESC.
They said all appeals for ending load shedding have fallen on deaf ear and in the current situation Karachi traders are not able to pay their taxes; therefore, a two-year tax holiday be given to them by declaring Karachi a calamity-hit area.

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