A peel for calm as India cries for onions
PEEL an onion in India and you find a potential political crisis. The capital of New Delhi and states across the country are in the grip of a huge onion shortage and prices have skyrocketed over the past fortnight. Not surprisingly, there have been calls for heads to roll.
Heavy rains and high humidity in onion-producing states have delayed the harvest and those onions already picked and stored in warehouses have become rain-sodden, with a resulting five-fold increase in the retail price — and this at the height of the festival season.
For the past week all major newspapers have carried front-page stories and editorials about the crisis, with accompanying photographs of angry shoppers despairing over the price and poor quality of the pungent orbs that are available.
So grave is the situation that Prime Minister Manhoman Singh is said to be monitoring developments daily.
Heavy rains and high humidity in onion-producing states have delayed the harvest and those onions already picked and stored in warehouses have become rain-sodden, with a resulting five-fold increase in the retail price — and this at the height of the festival season.
For the past week all major newspapers have carried front-page stories and editorials about the crisis, with accompanying photographs of angry shoppers despairing over the price and poor quality of the pungent orbs that are available.
So grave is the situation that Prime Minister Manhoman Singh is said to be monitoring developments daily.
In India the humble onion is the basic ingredient in most cuisine and, along with grains, the staple for the poor. Here, a meal is not a meal without an onion.
No comments:
Post a Comment