The police in Karachi, people in Lahore, and business community in Peshawar have thrown caution to the winds amid third wave of coronavirus and violating lockdown restrictions and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).
The violation of coronavirus SOPs is no more limited to people but the police and business community are also lending a hand.
In the megacity Karachi, Ajmer Nagri Police Station House Officer (SHO) has allowed establishment of Monday bazaar in the Sector-4 area of the jurisdiction.
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Sources told New360 that the SHO had received backhanders to grant permission to establish a bazaar.
Similarly, the police official has also allowed all businesses to open in the W-9 area in the precincts of the police station. Sources added that SHO has taken Rs 5,000 bribe from each shopkeeper.
Fruther, News360 correspondent visited Krishna Nagar Bazaar in Punjab’s capital, Lahore.
The correspondent observed blatant violation of precautionary guidelines during the market survey that as masses preferred shopping over lives.
Sources said shopping in multiple bazaars of Lahore is underway clandestinely.
It added the district administration has taken Rs 1,000 each from each shopkeeper and Rs 500 from hawkers and kiosks’ owners in Krishna Nagar Bazaar against the permission of doing businesses clandestinely, behind the closed shutters.
As soon as customers arrive, they are let into the shop and the shutter is pulled down again.
The police and administrative officials patrol in the markets as a formality but the business activities are being carried out under their nose.
Sources told that the police arrest violating shopkeepers but release them after receiving backhanders.
While talking to News360, the visitors opposed the lockdown orders and said Eid shopping was necessary.
The disregard to Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) is not confined to Lahore and Karachi but the traders’ community in Peshawar is continuing with business activities in defiance of lockdown orders.
A video clip that surfaced on the internet showed shopkeepers fleeing a plaza on Tangi Road in Peshawar as they learned about the arrival of police and administration.
Many of them got injured in the fleeing attempt as well as they jumped from several feet above.
With contribution from Our Correspondents Aneela Shaheen, Danyal Rathore and Abdul Qadir Mangrio