SUKANTA HALDER and AHMED HUMAYUN KABIR TOPU

Onion prices witnessed a sharp fall in different parts of Bangladesh yesterday, a day after the government gave the go-ahead to import the vegetable from India.

According to the state-run Trading Corporation of Bangladesh, the local variety of onion was sold at Tk 80 to Tk 90 per kilogramme (kg) on Monday, which was a Tk 10 decline from Sunday’s retail prices.

Prices of the local variety of onion increased by 81 per cent in the last month, prompting the agriculture ministry to import the cooking ingredient to stabilise the volatile market.

The fall of onion prices by Tk 10 per kg a day after the import permission only suggests that a certain section of traders manipulated the market for more profit, claimed AHM Shafiquzzaman, director general of the Directorate of National Consumers Rights Protection (DNCRP).

“We requested the commerce ministry to give import permission a month ago to contain onion prices. Had that been implemented at the time, the sufferings of consumers could have been less,” Shafiquzzaman told The Daily Star.