‘Bangladesh will cut its coat according to cloth while importing onion from India’
India yet to approach Bangladesh, says commerce minister
India's ruling Narendra Modi-led government is in a difficult position after importing onions to meet local demands. Now the country has offered Bangladesh to buy its imported onions.
Speculations are rife that India is trying to pass unwanted imported onions on to Bangladesh.
"We are yet to get any proposal," said Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi while briefing the reporters after a meeting of Cabinet Committee on Government Purchase at the Secretariat in Dhaka on Thursday.
Asked what the government would do if it got the proposal, Tipu said, "We are importing from other countries. If their [India's] proposal is suitable, we will consider it. But it's not under our consideration right now."
India started importing onions to keep prices down and meet domestic demands. However, questioning the quality, the state governments rejected the onions imported by the centre.
However, due to floods in Maharashtra and other areas of India this year, onion yields were greatly affected. After India banned onion export in September to control the local demand, prices shot up from Tk30-40 a kg to Tk250 in Bangladesh as it depended mostly on imported produce.
The prices eased as Bangladesh started importing onions from other countries like Turkey, Egypt, China and Myanmar.
To keep the supply and prices of onions normal in the country, the Ministry of Commerce extended the sale of onions through the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh's trucks across the country; but to no avail.
