Prices take back seat in poll heat

MUMBAI: It���s quite telling how political parties are becoming increasingly insensitive to issues affecting common man. Even as parties are busy wooing voters, they have maintained a silence over price rise in essential commodities.

On Wednesday, onion prices went up to Rs 30 per kg, up 55% over the past week in Mumbai as hoarders are believed to be sitting on large stocks and betting on further price rise due to floods in the major producing states of Karnataka and Maharashtra.

According to an official from the Agriculture Produce Marketing Corporation (APMC), the price of the popular Nashik variety has gone up to Rs 1,650-2,000 per quintal this week in wholesale market. Last week, it was available for Rs 438 per quintal at Lasalgaon, one of the biggest onion markets in the country.

���The prices would remain high due to floods in Andhra, Karnataka and Maharashtra,��� an APMC official said. Prices of other vegetables, too, have risen sharply. Traders say prices may go up further, as kharif sowing has more or less failed.

One would think that such a steep rise in price would be used by the Opposition to corner the ruling alliance. But strangely it is yet to take up the issue. Incidentally, the rising onion prices had robbed the BJP of power in 1998.