Profiteering: People at mercy of unregulated butchers

Ag APP

Islamabad: The residents have complained about the unreasonably high charges of professional butchers and demanded regulation by the district administration.

They said the situation had forced them to turn to amateur slaughterers on Eid due to low wages.

During a visit to the capital city’s various markets, ‘The News’ learned that the butchers charged Rs4,000-Rs5,000 each for slaughtering goats and Rs9,000-Rs12,000 each for calves and bulls. In upscale areas, the rates were even higher.

The rates are the highest on the first day of Eid, less on the second day and the minimum on the third day.

Unlike the past, they don’t go from door to door to butcher animals on Eid days and ask people to bring their animals to their shops to save time for better earning. They however offer home service to influential and affluent people at exorbitant charges.

The butchers began booking animals for slaughter days before the sighting of the current Zilhaj moon and that, too, after getting some advance payment.

The people said the butchers profiteered without let or hindrance forcing them opt for low-paid ‘unprofessional’ ones, mostly the residents of Islamabad’s rural areas, who appeared on the streets during Eid days holding choppers, axes, knives and wooden pieces.

They however complained that most of such untrained butchers damaged the animals’ hide and meat.

Some residents said they engaged ‘seasonal’ butchers only to slaughter and skin animals and remove offal as they later chopped the meat by themselves as needed and desired.