Powerless to stop vegetables from rotting

POWERLESS PEOPLE: The Vashi agrciulture market is gearing up for a trying season this summer.

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Mumbai: The Vashi Agriculture Produce Market in Mumbai is a bustling place with over 3,000 people working at any given point and thronged with customers.

But, this summer, customers are becoming a rare commodity as the traders and vendors become an unhappy lot.

Nilesh Bhai enters his stall at the produce market each morning, to a dark future. Nearly 600 condiments traders like him at the market face a similar blackout from 1130 hrs IST for nearly four to five hours each day.

And all their Gods remain powerless at least until 1530 hrs IST when the power finally returns to the market - but by then the damage is done.

Says Nilesh, "We can't work. There is no power here for four to five hours in the peak sales hours. Customers can't see what we're selling."

Nilesh Bhai's investment of Rs 1,500 in an inverter, offers him a respite of just a couple of hours, but the electricity bill gives them a shock.

Adds another trader, Amrish, "We have been getting a bill of Rs 1,680 but now with the power cuts for so many hours we are getting a bills of Rs 2,600!"

Things are no different with Haresh Bhai who is a fruit merchant at the vegetable market.

"Fruit has been selling at a 10 to15 per cent loss these few days for everything is getting spoilt and packaging too cannot be done," says he.

The traders of the Vashi Maharashtra Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC), the largest wholesale market in Maharashtra complain of step motherly treatment and believe there is something rotten with the system and it isn't their fruit or vegetables.

Says the APMC Director, Mohan Gurnani, "We were shifted from Mumbai to Navi Mumbai and promised full facilities to run our business. Forget facilities, we can't even function here."

And with the mandi (fruit and vegetable market) hotting up for a trying season, this powerless issue promises to raise a huge stink.