The New Nation - Internet Edition

Talha Bin Habib

The price of different varieties of rice, lentils, fishes, sugar and vegetables are on high trend in the city kitchen market yesterday despite the measures taken by the Government to contain it.

Price of different categories of soybean oil have slightly reduced while the prices of all iftar items like puffed rice (muri), bason, gram and dates have increased abruptly causing a fresh concern for the consumers as the holy month of Ramzan is just couple of days ahead.

Customers said, the high trends of essential price were forcing them to pay extra money of their limited income.

They said that some unscrupulous businessmen were hoarding the essentials commodities and deliberately increasing the prices of commodities to make windfall of profit despite sufficient supply of necessary items to the markets.

If this upward trend of commodity price is continued then it would not be possible for us to manage meagre quantity of itfar items for our family members, they added.

They urged the Government to start market price monitoring and surveillance so that none could hoard any commodity for making unethical profit.

We know that the Government has taken some measures for arresting the skyrocketing prices of essentials but so far it did not create any positive impact on the market price, said Abul Baten, a private service holder at Khilgaon Bazar.

Traders said that they were not hoarding any essential items rather selling those to the customers with minimal margin of profits.

The ongoing rainfalls were causing obstacles to the smooth supply of vegetables to the markets and had made a little increase of vegetables price, they claimed.

The prices of onion and lentils have gone high despite sufficient stock and supply to the markets.

Coarse variety of rice was sold at Tk 33 to 34, minincate Tk 40 to 44, lata between Tk 37 and Tk 38, nazirshail Tk 42 to 44 yesterday.

Per packet of ata containing two kg was sold at Tk 75 that was Tk 78 and sugar at Tk 36 that was Tk 34 during the last week. Per kg of soybean was sold at Tk 108 to 110 yesterday, which was Tk 114 to Tk 116 during the last week. Super soybean was sold at Tk 88 to 90 that was Tk 96 per kg over the past week.

Muri (puffed rice) was sold between Tk 54 and Tk 70 that was Tk 48 to Tk 50 and bason was sold between Tk 90 and Tk 110 per kg and gram was at Tk 55 to Tk 60 per kg yesterday which was sold at Tk 48 per kg during the last week.

Different variety of dates were selling between Tk 80 and TK 400 per kg yesterday, which was Tk 55 to Tk 60, and Tk 350 to Tk 360 per kg respectively during the last week.

Local variety of onion was sold at Tk 34 to Tk 35 per kg yesterday which was Tk 32 and imported ones was sold between Tk 24 to Tk 25 per kg which was Tk 22 over the past few weeks.

Pulse of Kheshari variety was sold between Tk 52 and Tk 54 per kg yesterday which was Tk 48 in the past week and red lentils (masur) was sold at Tk 108 to Tk 110 per kg yesterday which has almost remained unchanged during the last couple of weeks.

Potato was sold at Tk 17 to Tk 18, papaya at Tk 14 to Tk 16, green chilli at Tk 70 to Tk 80 which was between Tk 40 to Tk 50 over the past few weeks and tomato was sold at Tk 65 to Tk 70 per kg yesterday.