If onions started it, can rest of the vegetables be far behind?

Onions are Rs65-95 a kg, depending on where you live, tomatoes Rs75-80, capsicum Rs40, cauliflower is Rs80 and Brinjals and beans Rs60 a kg.

Mumbai is wondering how to cope with this onslaught. From Breach Candy to Borivli, from Bori Bunder to Bhandup, the exasperation over making ends meet seems to have become the great levelling theme of the season.  

“The lady fingers are quite fresh, tai. Only Rs20 for a quarter kilo,” calls out Bhavani Yadav from his market perch at Dadar. Sulabha Vadiya has been buying from the same stall for decades, but she looks for ‘cheaper’ stalls.

“I have been resorting to making kadhi with pakodas and dal with masala,” she told DNA.  

A resident of Shivaji Park, Aditi had felt that starting a nutritious tiffin service would help her add to the family kitty at a time when prices are making everyone tighten their belts.

“Now, we are stuck. If we raise prices in keeping with the market then this will see our patrons vanish, and if we continue, we won’t be able to break even,” she says. 

At tony Breach Candy we are shocked to see a bundle of garden fresh coriander smaller than the circle of the index finger and thumb cost a whopping Rs75.

“Isn’t this the season when leafy vegetables are cheaper as they are in abundance,” asks an angry Niloufer Shah who works at a local pre-school part time. “Leneka toh loh madam, nahin toh chhodo,” says the vendor without even bothering to look her way.

He tells us, “In this neighbourhood, people only want quality and don’t mind paying what is demanded.” But he is proved wrong thrice in quick succession. The last homemaker Indu Malkani taunts, “I don’t want to keep it in my safe. I need it to cook.”