Lack of precautionary measures can turn Lunda bazaars into corona hotspots

MULTAN: As winter sets in, hordes of people were seen bargaining with retailers at Lunda bazaars of the Multan city amid no precautionary measures and violations of coronavirus Standard Operating Procedure (SOPs). Vendors and shopkeepers of the city experienced a hike in sales as compare to the previous year.

All kinds of winter wear and accessories including gloves, woolen hats, mufflers, pullovers, sweatshirt and jackets were seen displayed in front of stalls, shops and weekly bazaars to attract customers. Stalls of winter clothes and shoes could be seen at Fountain Chowk, Hussain Agahi Bazaar, Gardezi Market and in many other streets of the city.

Most of the visitors of these bazaars can be seen violating coronavirus SOPs as no one was seen wearing masks and violation of social distancing and public interaction could convert Lunda bazaars into coronavirus hotspots. Many customers, however, complained that second-hand clothes had also become expensive. Prices of used clothes been increasing every ear, commented a customer Khurram Shahzad at Hussain Agahi Bazaar. He said that due to entrance of wealthy families, the shopkeepers had increased the rates of used cloths and made it out of reach of the common man.

A second-hand clothes dealer Juma Khan said that they had bought those clothes at exorbitant rates from wholesale dealers of other cities and that is why they were selling accordingly to earn profit. Rao Tanveer, a clothes-dealer at Fountain Chowk said that our business was in loss these days due to coronavirus as most of the customers were avoiding visiting these places.

He however, maintained that the business was on risk if the government imposed lockdown in these areas. Customers, however, had become more selective in their purchases, he told. They not only select clothes which had the best quality, but also try to buy these cloths at throwaway prices, said Ghulam Mustafa, a salesman at Hussain Agahi Lunda Bazaar.

Shakoor Ahmed, a customer at the same bazaar, said that these bazaars offer cheap and inexpensive clothes, because prices of new winter clothing were out of the reach of common man. We rush to these seco d-hand clothes stalls where we get decent quality clothes at affordable rates”, he maintained. He also said that public gathering and absence of precautionary measures was a real threat to public lives at these points and demanded of district administration to ensure implementation of SOPs.

It was also observed that the vendors had covered the road at Hussain Agahi Bazaar where concerned department were playing a role of silent spectators as traffic jam, minor accidents becomes a common thing. The negligence of district administration towards these points could foil all efforts of the government in controlling coronavirus.