The consumption of pulses in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh has gone up as vegetable prices has soared due to the monsoon rain and made people change their culinary habit.
For the past few months there have been a gradual rise in the prices of vegetables and currently the prices are bothering a lot of people as a result they have tweaked their eating habit a bit by replacing vegetables with pulses. Megha, a housewife from Chandigarh said that the prices of onion which were Rs 30 per kg a week back is now being sold for Rs 50 to 60 per Kg in the shops operated by the Government, popularly known as ‘Apni Mandis’. Price of ginger, garlic, chilies and green vegetables has also risen exponentially making it difficult for the customers to purchase them.
“We are fed up with these ever rising prices of necessary commodities and now it is high time that the Government of India should do something to save the interest of the common man”, added Megha. Nisha Sharma, a resident of Sector-39 said, “Price rise of vegetables has now become a regular affair and this in turn has a negative impact on my household budget. Hence I have started putting more pulses in my family’s regular courses of meal and have cut down vegetable consumption to keep my monthly budget stable.” Vegetable prices in retail market is higher than the prices of vegetables available in Apni Mandi’s as the supply is less and demand is always there. Radhey Shyam, president of Vegetable market Sector 26 told The Pioneer that due to continuous rainfall in several parts of the country, the rates of vegetables has gone up.