No business on Dhanteras for city's gold hub

Kolkata: The Dhanteras market has not yet kicked off as shopkeepers in Bowbazar, the city's gold hub, are facing short supply as most of the jewellery workshops were affected because of East West Metro's construction work.

"We have neither received a single order for gold nor supplied a single ornament for Dhanteras this year, because our gold ornament manufacturing unit is now under debris," said Bharat Soni, who owns a jewellery manufacturing unit at 10/2 Syakra Para Lane.

While the jewellery shops are located on the main stretch of B B Ganguly Street, the workshops of the artisans associated with these shops are located in and around Durga Pithuri Lane, Syakra Para Lane and Gour De Lane. 350 such artisans working in 85 workshops located in this area are now at a complete loss.

"Papers of transaction, other documents of orders

and even raw materials for the manufacture of jewellery are lying trapped," Soni pointed out.

"If trends are to be followed then both goldsmiths and gold shop owners have been suffering losses since 2017. With announcement of demonetisation on November 8, 2016, the gold traders lost 75% business. The market is constantly changing and going down. We are suffering losses. Earlier, Dhanteras was seven days of business. Now it is only one day of business for us," said Rudra Roy, a jewellery shop owner at Bowbazar.

He reiterated that August 2019 has been considered as 'black August' as the price of one gram gold jumped from Rs 3,300 to Rs 3,900 during the period.