From Our Correspondent
Guwahati: Scorching prices of essentials and garments are playing the spoilsport for the common man even as the festive season begins with Durga Puja festival in Assam Northeast along with the rest of the country.
Hundreds of plus puja pandals are being readied to host the well decorated and dazzling idols of Goddess Durga in all the urban centers Assam, most of those are in the region’s main city of Guwahati.
However, the common people are crying hoarse over the sizzling prices before Puja festival.
They can’t be blamed too when the vendor in the market quotes Rs 80 a kilogram of tomato, Rs 40 for a kilogram of brinjal or French beans while prices of elite vegetable like capsicum have crossed Rs 120 mark in the retail market.
“The puja festivities are not for us, but for the rich ones. With prices of essentials and edibles hitting the roof, people like me can’t even by sufficient quantity of vegetables and pulses for my four-member family. Where is the money to buy new clothes for my two children? said Angshuman Barua, an employee of a private construction company.
The vegetable vendors also have arguments to justify the unprecedented high prices.
“What can we do when the wholesaler hike the prices. We also have to earn a living out of the day’s sale proceeds,” said Dharmendra Deka a vegetable vendor in a city market.
It is actually the middlemen who are calling the shots in determining prices of vegetables in the Northeast where the governments have no marketing chains in place to have a control over the price line.
“Mafias running the vegetables and fish market in the region and governments prefer to keep a blind eye as ruling party politicos and bureaucrats get the share of profit as the cost of common man,” said Apurba Kumar Bhattacharjee, a senior leader of Opposition Asom Gana Parishah (AGP) in Assam.
However, even as the common men are complaining about escalating prices of edibles and essentials, the car deals and jewelers in Guwahati and other urban centres are doing a brisk business this season with the rich people are just in the mood for owning swanky cars notwithstanding the rising fuel prices and gifting trendy ornaments to near and dear ones ahead of the festive season.
