Islamabad - With the weather rapidly turning chilly, the sale of tea, coffee and soup is on the rise in the markets of the capital with each passing day. Shoppers visiting the markets of Aabpara, Super Market, Jinnah Super Market, Karachi Company and Blue Area like to enjoy soup, coffee and tea to keep themselves warm in the cold evenings. Awais Ali, a shopper in Blue Area, said he always enjoyed a hot cup of tea or soup whenever he went out for shopping. Green tea and soup gave the much-needed warmth in the cold weather of Islamabad, he added.
People who come to the markets with their families and friends surround the stalls and spend time chatting, as they sip their tea or take soup. A stallholder said as the weather turned cold, his sale of tea and soup went up.
Many people cannot afford to go and buy tea, soups and snacks from big hotels, so they are content to buy them from stalls in nearby markets. Meanwhile, the firewood and coal demand has increased due to the fall of mercury and gas loadshedding in various sectors and other localities in the federal capital.
Mushtaq Ahmed, a resident of F-8 sector said that the sale of firewood and coal had increased for last few days as temperature had decreased.
He said that most of the hotels also started using firewood and coal for cooking due to low gas pressure. He said that coal being sold at Rs 50 per kilogram.
A hotel owner at Civic Center (Melody) claimed that his expenses had registered a significant increase due to use of firewood, adding that per 40kg firewood was available at Rs 1000 to Rs 1100 , which forced him to increase the prices of dishes. The shoppers claimed that the prices of coal and firewood were different in various localities, adding that it were available at Rs 1100 to Rs 1200 per 40 kilogram.
“The jump in prices of firewood was because of huge transportation cost”, the owner of a firewood stall, in I-9 sector claimed.
Muhammad Shah, another wood stall holder at I-8 sector claimed that the prices of firewood and coal had been increased by the firewood traders on their own.