A visit to the market this week is likely to burn a hole in residents’ pockets. Heavy rains and flooding have destroyed a lot of crops and sent prices of vegetables shooting through the roof. 

“Till 10 days ago, I was selling 50kg of potol a day. Since supply got hit, I’m getting only 10kg and even that is not running out as the prices are so high,” laments Goutam Saha, a vegetable vendor at BJ Market. The price of potol at his shop has jumped by Rs 10 per kg since the rains last week (see box). 

A BC Block resident, Samir Pal Choudhury, was spotted haggling over prices with a vegetable vendor at BD Market on Tuesday. “The prices have gone up exponentially. Onions are selling for Rs 50 a kilo! Last month, the price was half of this. It’s the same with jhingey, potol and cucumbers,” said Choudhury.

On the other side of the counter, vendor Anuful Das tried his best to explain the sudden rise in prices. “There have been heavy rains for more than 10 days. Not only are the fields inundated but the trucks are having trouble reaching the wholesale markets on time. Supply of vegetables has dropped. We are trying our best not to pass on the burden to the customers. Even a sack of potatoes is now costing Rs 50-100 more than it did last month,” said Das.

“From experience, we expect a degree of price rise every monsoon but the price hike in the past week has been astronomical,” says Gopal Ghosh, a hawker who buys vegetables from Ultadanga and sells them from his cycle van in the lanes of AH, AJ and CK blocks. “Suppliers say it could get worse in the days to come as the water recedes and farmers take stock of the ruins.”

Wholesale hike

Most vendors in Salt Lake markets source their stock from Muchibazar, Sealdah’s Koley Market and Ultadanga. At the wholesale market near Muchibazar, wholesale prices are somewhat lower than in Salt Lake but traders say even these have risen in the last month. “Local fish mongers and vegetable vendors who would buy their stock from us have drastically reduced their purchases because the end-customers cannot afford to spend so much,” says secretary of the market, Bhola Shankar Shaw.

New Town Home Delivery is a company that supplies vegetables to homes in Salt Lake and New Town directly from the farmers of Bhangore, adjoining Rajarhat. “The farmers have been calling us up and crying. They have lost so much,” says Ekramul Islam, himself the son of a farmer and one of the men behind the venture. “We source vegetables from 200 farmers and so are still managing to supply everything but the situation is bad. We are supplying around 500kg of vegetables a day.”
But at some shops, the prices of certain vegetables have remained unchanged, if not reduced over the last week.

“Potatoes still cost Rs 10 a kg because they come from old stores. Similarly, pumpkins, tomatoes and capsicums come from Bangalore and so are not affected much by the rains,” says Ashok Poren, a vendor of CK Market.

Bearing the brunt

Tanima Das, a GC Block homemaker, has changed the menu at the dinner table because of soaring vegetable prices. “I’m not buying jhinge for Rs 70! I’ll get nearly half kilo of chicken for that much,” she said, while shopping at GD Market on Tuesday. So she has reduced vegetable dishes on the menu and is serving eggs for breakfast and chicken for dinner. “My son, who is in Class VIII, is quite happy as he does not like vegetables in the first place.”

Then again, those like Rohit Pratik believe this is a part of life. “Every monsoon, the prices of vegetables rise and in winter they drop. We have to adjust,” said the resident of New Town’s Greenwood Park, shopping at BJ Market. 
The food home delivery service has taken a hit. “The other day we tried raising the price of our chicken meal from Rs 150 to 160 but upon hearing the price, a customer flatly said she couldn’t afford it and backed out.

So we decided not to raise prices,” said Partha Das of the CA Block-based Amita’s Kitchen. He buys vegetables from Bagmari, Maniktala and Muchibazar, instead of Salt Lake, as they come at a fraction of the prices. 

FC Block’s Dui Burir Hesel has gone ahead and raised the price of their vegetarian meal from Rs 80 to 90. “Customers are aware of the rising prices and so have not objected to it,” says proprietor Indrani Brahma. They do their shopping from the market behind Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. 

On the scales

Vendors say that their rohu and katla come from the southern states of India. “But the trucks ferrying them to Calcutta are getting stuck in the waters so prices have risen somewhat,” says BJ Block fishmonger Soumit Karal. 
Varieties that are caught from local bheris have been hit directly. “The water level has risen so high in the bheris that they are not being able to cast their nets properly. The supply of parshe, tangra, prawn, bhekti, talapia have dropped,” says CK Market fishmonger Dhiren Debnath. 

Before the rains, he would get 20kg of tiger prawn at a time but his suppliers can now give no more than 10kg. So the prices have risen from Rs 400 to 500 a kilogram. “And not everyone can afford such rates. A man who comes to buy 1kg of fish hears the prices and buys only 300g,” says Karal of BJ Market. 

Most fishmongers in Salt Lake source their stock from the Ultadanga fish wholesale market and traders there explain the prices. “We usually have 60 to 70 trucks of fish coming a week, most of them from Andhra Pradesh. But Rath, Id and a local festival in Andhra Pradesh meant many truck drivers and fishermen were on leave. The number of trucks coming in had dropped to just 15 to 20. Now it has risen to 50 and things will improve now,” said trader Pintu Mondal. 

Share your experience of shopping for fish and vegetables this monsoon.
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The Telegraph Salt Lake, 6, Prafulla Sarkar Street, Calcutta 700001