rawalpindi - wwAll Rawalpindi Restaurants Association on Sunday showed their utter disappointment over Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government’s proposed annual budget for “giving no relief to their businesses” that have been shuttered since March this year due to COVID-19 outbreak.

The general council of the association met here under the chair of Mumtaz Ahmed, chairman of the food standing committee of Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce.

The representatives and restaurants’ owners of the garrison city also expressed their dismay over the government’s indifferent attitude towards the restaurant business throughout the country and for not bringing the gas tariff of eateries at par with that of tandoors.

President of the association Sain Muhammad Ijaz in the meeting demanded from the government that their businesses should be opened at once and they should be given relief in the gas tariff owing to their losses for the past few months. He reminded that eateries were facing closures since March 23 when the government imposed a lockdown throughout the country to further prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Ijaz underscored that the decision of the government not to open restaurant business was not logical at a time when it has already eased lockdown, opened all other businesses and even inter-city and inter-provincial transport has resumed.

A large number of owners of Rawalpindi-based eateries and senior representatives of the association participated in the meeting including Sheikh Munir, Chaudhry Khalid Mahmood, Malik Aftab, Haji Irfan, MianHumaSadiq, Muhammad Yousaf, ChaudhryShehroz, Raja Adnan, Khalid Butt and Rizwan Khan.

Muhammad FarooqChaudhry, Secretary General of the association, told the participants that the PTI government not only has allowed other industries to open after ending lockdown but also most of these have been given relief packages.

“Neither the government announced a relief package for the restaurant business nor we have been allowed to open our eateries,” he said adding that restaurants were doing only 10 percent business through take away services even after the resumption of transport and railway services.