Onion battles come to an end
Even 20 days ago, trucks of the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh, were surrounded by angry mobs fighting for the subsidised onions
The fall of onion prices has brought a peaceful end to the regular battles previously fought over subsidised onions sold by the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB).
Meanwhile, TCB decided to reduce the price of onions from Tk45 per kg to Tk35 per kg, due to low demand for the commodity.
"We decided to decrease the price of subsidised onions based on the low demand at kitchen markets," TCB spokesperson Humayun Kabir told The Business Standard.
On Sunday, only six to seven people were seen standing in front of TCB trucks at different points of Dhaka. There were no angry mobs and no fights ensued – unlike the scenario just 20 days ago.
The TCB is now selling onion at 50 points of Dhaka. Each truck contains 3,000kg of onion.
At Khamarbari, the TCB truck started selling onion from 11am. One of the consumers, Abul Kalam said, "I didn't come here to buy onion as I saw people had to fight for buying onions from TCB truck. But today I saw only a few people. So I bought 5 kg of onions."
He added that there was no limitation on how much onions a person could buy.
By 1pm, the TCB truck sold 300kg of onions only. Previously, during the onion crisis, most of the trucks would sell half of the stock by 1pm. But now they cannot even sell all the onions in a day.
The public demand for onion is yet to rise since it fell with soaring prices.
On Sunday, in the kitchen markets of the city, onions imported from Turkey, China and Myanmar were sold at Tk80-100, Tk50, and Tk90-100 per kg, respectively. Locally grown onions were sold at Tk100 per kg.
Retailers at Karwan Bazar said people are yet begin buying large amount of onions.