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| A fish seller at Lalpur market in Ranchi on Monday. Picture by Manik Bose |
Ranchi, Oct. 5: The rampaging floods in Andhra and Karnataka have left their mark on Jharkhand that is suddenly seeing a phenomenal rise in prices of onion and fish.
Onion, that was till yesterday selling at Rs 14 per kg, today shot up to Rs 22 in the open market. And the going rate for rohu or katla fish, bulk of which comes to Ranchi and its nearby areas from Andhra, was anything between Rs 100 to Rs 140 per kg, a rise of around 35-40 per cent in the last two days.
Wholesalers are blaming the floods in Andhra and Karnataka. They pointed out that this year, prices had also shot up in Nasik — the primary supplier of onion from Maharashtra — adding to the overall problem.
They fear that prices of both fish and onion could rise even further in the coming days.
“Businessmen are attributing the price rise to the floods in Andhra and Karnataka. We will soon convene a meeting of wholesalers to discuss the issue,” said John Bhuiyan, the secretary of Pandra Bazar Samiti, a state panel that supervises distribution of edible consumer items.
Jharkhand gets the bulk of its onion supply from Maharashtra, Andhra and Karnataka. While supplies from Maharashtra, Bhuiyan said, had dwindled, the floods had affected supplies from the South where a chunk of the stock had been damaged in the floods.
“Jharkhand gets about 80-90 tonne of onion from other states daily. But we expect prices to come down in the next week once the floods ease in the South,” said Anchal Kinger, the president of Federation of Jharkhand Chamber of Commerce and Industries (FJCCI), asking consumers not to panic.
The district administration is also concerned about shopkeepers selling old stocks of onion at increased prices. “Shopkeepers should sell the old stock at the old rate i.e. at Rs 14 per kg. We are looking into this,” said sub-divisional magistrate Suchi Tyagi.
The price of fish on the other hand may not come down soon as floods in Andhra have virtually killed stocks. Supplies from Andhra have all but stopped for the last two days, forcing vendors to increase prices.
“In Ranchi alone we used to get 20 tonne daily. But for the last three days, we are only getting 2 tonne. This is why prices have shot up,” explained Raju Nishad, a wholesaler of fish in the capital.
Despite concerted efforts, local fish production in Jharkhand hasn’t picked up. While the annual requirement of fish in the state is one lakh million tonne, Jharkhand produces around 14,000 million tonne a year.