Onions that sold for Rs 42 per kg on Monday were selling for Rs 70-80 per kg on Wednesday. The Indian government had already banned the export of onions and eliminated an import duty on onions.
Onions are an essential ingredient for almost all Indian dishes. Onion prices have more than doubled in the past week. Retail prices of vegetables, such as beans, brinjal, cauliflower, cabbage, tomato and carrot, have shot up by 25 to 60% compared to prices around this time last year.
"When prices of onion, tomato, garlic, brinjal and other vegetables go up four-five times, there is not much we can do," says Swati Upadhaya, a homemaker from City Light area.
"It seems vegetable has become a commodity for the use of the very rich only," says another homemaker.
"We don't know to what to eat. Vegetables have become out of reach, pulses are already highly priced. What do we eat with roti?" asked a daily wage worker, who earns Rs 125 a day and has to manage a family of four. "It seems we have to spend days eating dry rotis or rice with salt," he lamented.
A rise in prices of rice, wheat and vegetables pushed India's annual rate of food inflation to 9.46% in the week ended December 4. This was the fourth week in a row when the food price index rose in the country, according to data released on Thursday. The food inflation was at 8.69% in the previous week.
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