GUWAHATI: With the price of onions touching Rs.100 a kg in Assam, opposition Congress on Friday staged a protest against it at the ongoing winter session of the Assembly.
Wearing onion garlands, a group of MLAs of the party shouted slogans against the rising price. They pilloried the state’s BJP-led three-party coalition government for failing to give relief to the people.
Congress MLA Rekibuddin Ahmed said the state government’s silence on the issue was its admission that it had failed to check the price.
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Later, he told journalists outside the Assembly building: “While replying to a query, the government said the wholesale price of one quintal onion ranges between Rs.6500-Rs.7200 and the retail price is Rs.71-Rs.80 a kg. So, the government admitted that it has failed to curb the price”.
This is for the first time in Assam that the retail price of onions has touched Rs.100 a kg. Till a fortnight ago, onion was sold at Rs.60 a kg in the state.
The traders in Guwahati’s Fancy Bazar, which supplies essential commodities to most parts of the Northeast, said the lack of supply, as a result of heavy rains in major onion-growing states, was the reason behind the rising price. The sale, according to them, has dropped by nearly 50 per cent.