Markets lose festive buzz as public curtails spending

Mumbai: This Diwali, people are being cautious while spending. The main market at Dadar, which is usually teeming ahead of the festival with buyers shopping for lanterns for rangoli, colourful dresses and firecrackers, is not as busy this year as it usually is. 

Hemant Tambe (55), a lantern seller from Dadar west, said, “ The market has gone down ‘ekdum madni’ as compared to last year. Last year I sold these lanterns for prices between Rs 500 to Rs 1,000. This year, the starting range is from Rs 1,000 to Rs 2,000.”

Both sellers and buyers don’t seem to be happy with the slab rates of the GST, which are set at 5 per cent, 12 per cent, 18 per cent and 28 per cent respectively. As a result, vendors who are already in a financial crunch face severe losses, as consumers are unwilling to shell out more money due to rising inflation post-GST.

Prakash Surve, a buyer who came to shop at Dadar, said, “Things have become costly, earlier I paid Rs 50 per small lamps (diyas), but I am now paying Rs 150 for the same. What to do, the economy is growing, but my salary is not growing.”

Charumani.S., another vendor who is a rangoli and lamp seller, said, “We will make profit, but now the margin has been reduced, so we’ll make less profit. I pray to god we will get whatever our expectations are.”