Srinagar: Days after Jammu and Kashmir government decontrolled mutton prices, meat dealers have constituted teams to check overpricing.
Last week, the Union Territory administration directed the Food Civil Supplies & Consumer Affairs Department to refrain from regulating prices of mutton and other livestock products.
After the announcement, the mutton dealers association fixed the price of mutton at Rs 650 per kilogram.
The rates of mutton, however, are violated by the butchers who sell it at exorbitant rates.
Now, the mutton dealers association has set up market checking squads to check overpricing.
“We have constituted our teams which are touring and inspecting various markets. In Srinagar and other districts, our teams are working at Mohalla and tehsil levels. We fixed rates of mutton Rs 650 per kg and it is very genuine,” Khazir Mohammad Regoo, President of Mutton Dealers Association Kashmir.
Regoo said the teams will report to the association about the adherence to rates by butchers in various districts. “We will take legal action against those butchers who sell mutton at exorbitant rates,” he said.
He appealed to the people to boycott butchers who sell mutton at exorbitant rates. “The onus lies on consumers as well. They should boycott butchers who sell mutton at higher prices. Once they boycott, others will not take the risk to violate our orders,” Regoo said.
The issue of controlling mutton and chicken prices in J&K has long been a contentious matter between the government and mutton traders.
For the last few years, mutton dealers and the government were at loggerheads regarding the fixation of mutton rates in the union territory.
Pertinently, the cost of mutton has risen by over 50 percent since 2019. Four years ago, a mutton kilogram cost a mere Rs 400. Despite a government-approved price of Rs 535 per kg, it was sold for Rs 650.
According to government figures, Jammu and Kashmir consumes 6 crore kg of mutton yearly, which means that Jammu and Kashmir spend Rs 3900 crore on mutton annually.
Over 50 percent of the mutton demand in Kashmir is met through imports from other states and union territories like Rajasthan and Delhi.
