Daily Times

LAHORE: The black marketing of fresh currency notes, which has been a regular feature of the days leading up to Eid, has picked up momentum, once again, on various roads of the provincial capital.

The purveyors of this ‘business’ are both men and women, who position themselves at various spots in the vicinity of the State Bank of Pakistan and other banks with packs of fresh currency notes, each pack consisting of 100 notes.

A pack of Rs 10 notes was on Friday available at Rs 200 premium, while the amount of premium increases for the bundles of fresh currency notes with higher value

Some of the ‘entrepreneurs’ in this business actually hire help to offer the fresh currency notes at different rates. People buy these notes for various reasons – unavailability of new notes in commercial banks is one. Others want to save time and avoid standing in long queues.

The demand for fresh currency notes sees a surge as Eid approaches as it is a tradition that elders distribute fresh currency notes as “Eidi” – an Eid gift – among children. It is this fondness with crisp new notes that the black marketers take advantage of.

Meanwhile, Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) on Friday filed a resolution in the Notice Branch of the Punjab Assembly secretariat against the black marketing of fresh currency notes in the city.

The resolution was submitted by the PPP legislator Mian Khurram Jahangir Wattoo. The resolution demanded the government to take notice of the illegal business.