BHUBANESWAR: The State Government was caught napping when essential commodities were fast vanishing from the market as traders resorted to massive hoarding to cash in on the panic buying by customers in anticipation of possible cyclone ‘Hudhud.’
Even though Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik claimed that his Government is well prepared to face the probable cyclonic storm, the administrative machinery failed to prevent the artificial scarcity of essentials created by unscrupulous traders.
While potato has done a vanishing act, prices of other vegetables have hit the roof. This despite Bhubaneswar receiving more than double its daily requirement of potato on Tuesday from West Bengal.
“Although 50 truckloads of potato (about 6,500 quintals) reached Aiginia, the main mandi of tuber, which even supplies potato to Puri and Nayagarh districts, the entire stock disappeared by evening,” said Aiginia Potato Merchant Association general secretary Shakti Shankar Mishra.
Unit I Market Association secretary Gayadhar Swain said persistent appeals to the customers not to go for panic buying went unheeded. “Usually, it takes four days to sell off 500 quintal potatoes, but today they were sold in half a day,” he said. Sources said the hoarding had already begun both at the wholesale and retail markets. Everyone in the business is trying to make a kill. Not only potato, onion and other vegetates are also vanishing from the market. There was also panic buying of other essentials like flattened rice, candles and eggs.
Prices hit the roof