Soaring prices of materials: Contractors announce to suspend work in Hazara division

MANSEHRA: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa contractors association has announced to suspend the work on government’s development projects being executed across the Hazara division, seeking cut in the construction materials prices.

“The construction materials prices have surged to a level where we can’t complete the execution of the ongoing schemes,” Arshad Khan, the vice-president of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government contractors’ association, told reporters here.

Flanked by other members of contractors’ association, he said that the federal government had failed to control the everyday increasing prices of the construction materials.

“The government pays contractors Rs140,000 per tonnes under its already set estimations but its market price surged to an all-time high of Rs240 per tonnes in the market,” he said.

Khan, who is also the district president of contractors association, said that the price of cement had jumped to Rs1100 from Rs600 per bag.

The KP contractor’s association vice-president said that they would not resume the execution of the development projects until the government brought soaring prices of construction materials to its previous level or increase their estimations in accordance with the current inflation in the country.