Mumbai:
For one kilogram of onions in Central Mumbai's Worli market, Shobha Kakde, a young housewife reluctantly pays the vegetable vendor Rs 35.
"Last week I bought onions for 25 odd rupees. How is it that the rates have climbed so much?" she rues.
In one week, the price of onions, a staple in many households, has risen by Rs 8. A staple in many households, the rise has hit the budgets hard.
Maharashtra's Agriculture Minister claims the spike is artificial, engineered by middlemen who are hoarding stocks to profit from it.
"The government is monitoring the situation. This is artificial scarcity created by middlemen," he said.
Around 400 kms away from Mumbai in Lasalgaon, the capital of onion production in India, Pandit Trambak Pingal, a farmer who grows onions in two acres of his five-acre plot says, "There is less onion to go around and that's hardened the prices."
"The drought in Maharashtra is to blame," he adds.
He agrees that middlemen, who have ability to stock the produce, are profiting by shrinking the supply to hike prices.
Onion is currently selling at Rs 2,700 a quintal. Last year at this time, the price hovered around Rs 1,200 a quintal.
Sitting in his godown in Nasik, stockist Subhash Zavar denies that middlemen like him are controlling the supply and eventually, the price.
"Half of the stock is over and only half is left in stock and so the price of onions has drastically increased and the price will continue to rise," he says.
Veggie prices had just started to cool down but now with the demand for more onion during Ramzan, the spike in prices will once again put pressure on household budgets.