147. Short Essay and Article on: Onions With Real Tears

While going to your school in the morning you noticed hundreds of men and women getting collected and queuing up before the vegetable booth of your locality. On inquiring you were told that they were waiting to buy 2 kgs. Of onion on their ration cards, which were otherwise available at a very high price in the open market? In anguish you decide to write an article for publication in a national daily, suggesting ways and means to overcome this problem and avert its recurrence in future.

Ans:- ONIONS WITH REAL TEARS

While going to my school this morning, I noticed hundreds of men and women crowding in front of a vegetable booth in our locality. Many of them had formed a queue and had little bags or baskets in their hands. On inquiring, I came to know that those people were waiting for their turn to buy 2 kgs of onion on ration cards. Onions on rations cards! Ever heard of it before? No doubt, the onion crop has been poor this year. Onions have become hard to see in the market. But quite strangely we can have any quantity of them at Rs. 90 a kg. The poor who can’t afford to pay such high prices has to queue up in front of vegetable booths set up by the government. They have to spend hours and hours to get their share of the ration in onions. On the other hand, hoarders and profiteers are having their heyday. They are minting money and the government is just standing as a looker-on. Setting up a few vegetable booths here and there is no solution to the problem. The government should come down heavily on hoarders and Profiteers and force them to bring out their stock in the open market. Sufficient quantities of onion can be imported to tide over the temporary shortage that has resulted from poor crops.