Residents of three provinces in Pakistan — Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh, and Balochistan — are facing dire economic conditions and food shortages following last year’s floods. In many areas, wheat has run out, leading to intense competition and even violence as people struggle to acquire even a small amount of flour.
Videos circulating on social media depict the desperate situation, with people scrambling to acquire flour from trucks and fighting over discounted bags in the market. The scarcity of food has led to widespread hunger, with reports of children crying from malnutrition.
According to the Express Tribune, thousands of people line up for hours every day to purchase discounted flour bags, as prices continue to soar. The cost of flour is particularly high in Karachi, where a kilogram is selling for 160 rupees, and in Islamabad and Peshawar, where a 10 kg bag is priced at 1,500 rupees per kilogram.
This scarcity of wheat has led to public unrest, with reports of a stampede in the Mirpurkhas district of Sindh resulting in one death. The stampede broke out as people scrambled to purchase subsidised flour, leaving a 40-year-old labourer dead after he fell in the melee.
Pakistan’s economic crisis comes amid a severe power shortage in the country. The energy crisis has led the government to impose a closure on markets and malls by 8 pm to save electricity.