As we speak, onion prices have reached as high as ₹102/Kilo in Mumbai and ₹160/Kilo in Thiruvananthapuram! Now, what might have caused this atrocious and unbelievable price increase? Well, I've got a few theories.
- Supply/Demand: This is a very obvious and natural reason which can be easily explained. Onion prices have risen in India before (though this time, its consistently higher for a much longer time), and the supply/demand imbalance was the culprit during most of the times.
- Hoarding by middle-men: Another reason, not so common but still happens a lot. The problem with our country is that some district or town level middle-man trader-sanstha will buy from farmers and then pass on to wholesalers or malls like D-Mart or other traders. All these middle-men in the supply chain have the opportunity to stock/hoard the onions thus causing its price to rise further.
- Maha politics: Maharashtra is one of the largest onion suppliers and rumor is that Sharad Pawar isn't quite happy to share power with Uddhav Thackeray who ended up becoming the CM in the recent political circus. He is pretty well-connected to control the supply of onions and we can't put it beyond this guy to have caused this as a political scoring point.
- Communist/Left conspiracy: This theory is often touted in social media. The Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) is in parliament right now and people are running this theory that urban-maoists are trying to hoard onions and bring up its price to blackmail the government and force them to not pass it. Well, difficult but not impossible me thinks!
- Pakistani conspiracy: Also quite popular on social media. Our friendly neighbor is already on bitter terms since Article-370 was passed and they lost Kashmir in August. The fact that they broke all diplomatic ties and even stopped the Samjhauta Express is proof of that. So, we cannot put it beyond the ISI/DGISPR to interfere in India's internal matters and run up the onion prices as a revenge, can we?
- Jain conspiracy: Its quite well known that the Jain community doesn't eat onions at all. Is it possible that they want the rest of the country to learn about their wholesome attitudes too? Many vegetable traders are Jains and together they can control enough supply to drive the price upwards!
- State's attempt to stop sexual offenses: Sexual offenses are on the rise in recent times. Unnao and Hyderabad rape cases had become urgent and pressing national issues. Now, its a well-known fact that onion is one of the greatest aphrodisiac food, so do you think our government itself might be trying to bring down onion consumption and the male libido and thus sexual crimes (as a result)?
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