Robbers eye pricey onion, 700 kg stolen in Mumbai

Mumbai, Aug 23: As onion prices hit the roof, robbers targeted a shop in suburban Mumbai and fled with 700 kg of kitchen staple worth about Rs 50,000, leaving the shocked owner in tears.

Fourteen sacks of onion were stolen from a shop of 55-year-old vegetable vendor Anant Naik at Prateeksha Nagar in Wadala apparently between Friday night and Saturday morning, police said.

"The sacks containing about 700 kgs of onions got stolen," Deputy Commissioner of Police (Detection) Dhananjay Kulkarni said.

"Naik had covered his stock of onions at around 9.30pm on Friday and left for home. When he returned on Saturday morning, 700 kg of onions kept in 14 sacks were missing," he told the police.

The stolen onion stock was estimated to be worth Rs 50,000, police said. A case has been registered in this regard under IPC section 379 (theft) at Wadala TT police station, they added.

The wholesale onion prices yesterday touched Rs 57 per kg at Lasalgaon in Maharashtra, Asia's biggest onion market, raising the possibility of further spike in retail prices in most parts of the country adding to consumers' woes.

In the price-sensitive Delhi market and some other parts of the country, retail onion prices have already gone up to Rs 80 per kg depending on the quality of the crop.

In spite of several government measures, the prices of onion have increased unabated both in the wholesale and retail markets in the last few weeks due to tight supply following shortfall in domestic output.

Also, the likely fall in this year's kharif (summer) crop due to deficit rainfall has further added fuel to the price rise.

PTI