Enforce govt order to stop price manipulation

It is unfortunate that price manipulation of daily essentials by unscrupulous businessmen continue unabated despite there being a government order to curb this illegal practice. According to a report in this daily on May 24, the government issued an order titled "Essential Commodities Distribution and Distributor Recruitment Order, 2011," under the Control of Essential Commodities Act, 1956, to curb price manipulation. But it has remained unimplemented for more than 11 years. That is because none of the stakeholders played their part—while importers and producers did not care to comply with the order, the authorities responsible for enforcing the order or monitor the market also did not do their job.

Since the government order was never enforced, dishonest businessmen often manipulated the supply of essential items by creating artificial shortages in the market to raise their prices. We have seen this recently in the case of edible oils, wheat, and other essentials. Had the government order issued in 2011 been properly enforced, we could have averted the edible oil crisis—or the authorities could have easily addressed it. Under the law, the government would have a list of distributors and the supply data of importers. With these crucial data in hand, the government could have identified and punished those responsible for creating the crisis without much difficulty.

The order states that importers or producers of essentials will designate one or more distributors in every upazila, city corporation and district and send their lists to a national committee. Importers or producers are also supposed to send information on the monthly supply of products to the committee. But this is not happening. And while the committee is supposed to sit every month to assess the stock, supply, sale and prices of essentials and take measures to ensure the availability of the goods in the market, so far, they have rarely met to assess the market situation and have not taken any measures to enforce the order.

   Like most of our laws or government orders, this order was also formulated—when the market situation was volatile—with no visible intention from the government's side to implement it. And it is the ordinary people who have had to—and still are having to—pay the price for that. But that should not be the case. We urge the government to enforce the order without further delay and identify and punish those responsible for manipulating the market.