Srinagar, Apr 16: Goods worth Rs 9.43 crore were traded across LoC through Uri-Muzaffarabad route this week.
 Custodian officer for cross-LoC trade at Trade Facilitation Centre, Salamabad, Muhammad Ashraf Wani said that for the first time since inception of the trade, over 120 trucks were dispatched across the LoC in a week from the Valley. 76 trucks were dispatched on Tuesday and 45 on Wednesday, he said.
  “The goods were weighing 9736 quintals and valuing Rs 3.69 crore, with fresh onions forming 80 per cent of the supply, whereas dry and fresh coconut were among the other items,” he said.
 Meanwhile, 110 trucks rolled down from the Chakoti Trade Centre, AJK, with 60 trucks received on Tuesday and 50 on Wednesday. “The trucks were laden with 8756 quintals of Pakistani moong (green gram) that was worth Rs 5.74 crore,” Wani said.
 He said the trade was conducted smoothly between the two sides. “Now Army is also cooperating with us after this newspaper highlighted that they were creating hurdles for the trade,” he said.
 Wani further said there was a rumour that trade of Pakistani green gram was again banned by the AJK government, “which however is not true.” “Infact now hundreds of traders from AJK are wishing to conduct the trade of Pakistani green gram and are not getting chance for the same since the number of these traders is very high,” he said.
 Meanwhile, according to some reports, three ISD telephone lines have been made functional for the traders of Poonch-Rawlakote route to facilitate interaction between the traders of Jammu and AJK.
 The officials at TFC Salamabad, however, said the telephone lines for the Valley traders were yet to be made functional.  “The process is currently undeway. Although two officials including myself have got connectivity with Pakistan, but traders do not have,” he said.

Lastupdate on : Fri, 16 Apr 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 16 Apr 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:00:00 IST