Rumour - Price rubs salt on potato wound

KalimNews: Rumour of salt scarcity and its price hike has spread in some places of West Bengal too. It all started from Orissa. 

Sandip Bal, TT, Bhubaneswar, Nov. 11: Salt seems to be going the potato way.

Even as the state struggles to overcome an unprecedented potato shortage, salt, too, seems to be on the verge of vanishing with apparent scarcity pushing up its prices.

Though the government claimed that massive buying of salt followed rumours of its shortage, people complained that it had indeed vanished from the market. Some people, who managed to buy salt today, paid as much as Rs 70 for one kilogram.

“When I heard about the shortage, I rushed to the market to buy a packet. I was surprised to see long queues in front of many shops late at night. I had to pay Rs 35 for a kg of a popular brand of salt, which normally costs Rs 16. Within a few minutes the shopkeeper told others waiting in the line that the stock was over,” said Nayapalli resident Satyasundar Naik.

The situation became grave this morning with people queuing up at grocers’ shops across the city to purchase salt. Some were seen buying more than 5kg of salt at a time. Consequently, shopkeepers hiked the prices.

Later in the day, the food supply and consumer welfare department issued a statement, urging people not to pay attention to rumours of salt shortage. “The government is taking stringent action against such rumour mongers,” said the statement.

Retailers across the city said that when people started buying salt in bulk, the stocks got exhausted. However, Sudhakar Panda, secretary of the All Odisha Traders’ Association, said that when he got to know about the rumours, he had immediately informed the district collector to appeal to the people not to resort to buy salt under any apprehension.

“We have enough stocks for more than a month. We do not know who spread these rumours,” said Panda.

The city needs around 10,000 tonnes of salt every month.

Sources said the rumours started from Nayagarh district last night. Salt superintendent for Odisha Harekrushna Agarwal said the state needed three lakh tonnes of salt every year while it produced 30,000 tonnes a year. Most of the salt requirement here is met by supply from Alwar in Rajasthan, Tutikoran in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat.

“The current situation must be the handiwork of a handful of traders. Action should be taken against such people,” said Agarwal. He was surprised how such rumours spread despite 16,000 tonnes of salt stocked in Ganjam district.

“We have instructed all the district collectors to intervene in the market. There is no short supply of salt and people should not panic. We will take steps against traders behind this,” said civil supply and consumer welfare secretary M.S. Padhi.

Salt was sold at normal rates in Bhubaneswar this afternoon following the government’s appeal. But, the situation is yet to be normal in some other districts.

Potato was sold in the city today after four days, albeit at a high rate. Ten trucks loaded with the tuber reached Bhubaneswar last night. The state government managed to procure 17 trucks from Bengal, of which 10 were sent to Bhubaneswar and seven to Cuttack. Civil supply officials were present today at Aiginia potato stockyard along with police officials to thwart any law-and-order problems when the vegetable was provided to the traders.

“We got potato at Rs 28 to 30 a kg from the wholesale market and we have been selling it accordingly,” said Ratnakar Sahu, a trader at Unit-IV. One kilogram of potato sold at Rs 40 at several parts of the city this afternoon.

Padhi said the Bengal government would take a decision today regarding supply of potato to Odisha. The neighbouring state has restricted the supply. “We expect the Bengal government to take a positive decision. Besides, through National Agricultural Co-operative Marketing Federation of India, we are planning to procure potato from Ranchi in Jharkhand and Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh,” said Padhi.