For a bag of flour.

Burgeoning inflation and a deepening cost-of-living crisis have left millions of people across Pakistan struggling to put food on their tables. In a bid to lift some burden off low-income families during Ramazan, provincial governments announced plans to distribute flour bags. However, unorganised distributions in parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa resulted in stampedes.

A man was killed in Charsadda, and several others were injured in Swabi and Kohat. Another man in Bannu died after the boundary wall of a flour mill collapsed ahead of flour distribution. In the Hasilpur Tehsil of southern Punjab, at least five women were injured in a stampede at a free flour distribution point. In January, a man was killed during a stampede at the sale point of subsidised flour in Mirpurkhas. Mill owners have halted production due to insufficient supplies while provincial governments claim that mill owners are hoarding subsidised wheat supplies and arbitrarily raising flour prices. It is the public that has to bear the brunt of this tussle between mill owners and the...