Better quality, guarantee on breakage attract people, say dealers
By: Ahmad Shabir
Anantnag: As the local brick kiln owners failed to adhere to the government rates, the people here in Jammu and Kashmir prefer to use Punjab bricks during the construction of their buildings as besides having better quality, the cost of per truck load remains almost same.
Administration last year fixed Rs 21000 for a truck load of bricks plus carriage and had constituted district level committees to ensure that the brick kiln owners abide by the directive.
However, most of the brick kiln owners did not give any damn to the government fixed rates and continue to sell a truckload of bricks at the rate of Rs 33000 to Rs 35000 with extra carriage.
The hike in brick prices forced the people to delay or halt their constructions as they had hoped that the brick prices will come down.
Nonetheless, a year later, as the prices of local bricks continue to shoot up, the youth in many areas of Anantnag worked on the idea to tie up with the brick kilns in Punjab and make available both machine made and handmade bricks available to the people at either the same rates or lesser.
Ishfaq Ahmad Bhat from Mahind village of Bijbehara, who started the brick business six months ago, said that he has sold at least 15 lakh bricks so far.
“As the brick prices in the Valley touched skies, the idea to bring better quality bricks from outside struck my mind. The response has been beyond my expectation. The demand is such that every month, I have to order at least 15 to 20 dumpers of bricks,” Ishfaq said.
People prefer the bricks from outside given their quality, he said. “We guarantee the customers that there won’t be a single half baked or broken brick in the vehicle containing 7000 bricks. Besides the quality, the reason for the people preferring outside bricks is that they arrive almost at the same rates,” Ishfaq said.
He said that they get a truck load of bricks from Punjab at the rate of Rs 18000 only but it is because of the huge transportation that the rates on arrival here go between Rs 34,000 to Rs 37,000.
A resident of Khiram, Khurshid Ahmad, who purchased bricks from Punjab for the second-storey of his house said that the bricks in Kashmir have turned gold despite being low in quality than those arriving from outside.
“I was waiting for the brick prices to come down for last one year but instead their prices continued to shoot up. During last one month, I visited many brick kilns in Anantnag and everywhere I was told the rates for a truck load of bricks between Rs 34,000 to Rs 37,000. Later, I went to a man from neighbouring village, Mahind who is selling the bricks from Punjab. The quality of bricks attracted me at the first sight and on enquiry about rates, I decided to purchase them at the very moment,” Ahmad said.
