Onions: India

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Onions and Indian politics

History shows onions can make parties cry

Rising Cost Of Vegetable Hits Aam Admi Hard

Akshaya Mukul | TNN

The Times of India 2013/08/

1981

There was a time when growing onion price contributed to the fall of otherwise credible Janata government in 1981 forcing Indira Gandhi, who made a big comeback after her defeat in 1977, to call it the Onion election.

Soon, she realized onions had made her cry as well. By November 1981, prices had sky-rocketed — Rs 6/kg — that Lok Dal’s Rameshewar Singh walked into the Rajya Sabha wearing a garland of onions and posters attached to it during the winter session. Chairperson M Hidayatullah asked him what was Singh wearing around the neck. After Singh complained of rising onion prices, Hidayatullah, known for ready wit, told him. “Let’s see what you will wear when the prices of tyres go up or for that matter the prices of shoes.”

Some members of Congres (S) protested with onions in their hand which they put on Hidayatullah’s desk. As the chairperson ordered removal of onions from his desk, Piloo Mody shot back, “It is very unfortunate that chairman should take away all the onions with him.” L K Advani then at his fiery best reminded the Congres how it had made onion an election issue and conveniently swept it under the carpet.

Next day, Mody offered Rao Birendra Singh Rs 100 in the Upper House, asking him to get 50 kg of onions if the price had really come down to Rs 2 per kg. Rameshwar Singh went a step ahead and put Rs 1,300 on Hidyatullah’s desk asking him to organize cheap onions. Amid the din, Congres’s Hari Singh Nalwa actually took the money and promised to supply onions. Such wit and repartee that made the larger point and forced the government to take action are now only part of archives as MPs rarely talk of onions or price rise and even when they do a deserted House greets them.

1988

But voters have a way of settling scores — something the political class knows too well. Be it the late Pramod Mahajan on whom agitated Nashik farmers had hurled onions in 2000 or the BJP that met its nemesis during the 1998 election in Delhi and Rajasthan, onions do shape opinions or as a Planning Commission member says, “Onion is the only way inflation is understood by ordinary people. To afford or not afford onion is how poverty is understood across the country. A callous government has turned deaf and opposition thinks it has enough to bring it back to power. Humble onion could have deep fry both.”