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I-T raids on onion traders over stock-hoarding & price manipulation

New Delhi: The Income Tax department launched nationwide raids on Monday targetted at rogue onion traders, who might be manipulating the price of the kitchen-staple.

I-T sleuths from across the country conducted search operations at more than 100 locations spread across at least five states. Officials here said that the raids were conducted in Rajasthan, Gujarat, Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and three cities in Maharashtra (Nashik, Nagpur and Mumbai), the most onion-producing state.

Sources in the know here said that I-T officials had acted upon information received about onion traders across the nation engaging in the hoarding of stocks, thereby subsequently being involved in price manipulation of the essential vegetable.

This comes days after the Central Government announced that the country would be importing 1 lakh tonnes of onion from the United Arab Emirates and other countries, to check the rising prices of the vegetable, whose production this year suffered due to heavy rain lashing across producing regions like the state of Maharashtra.

When the announcement was made, onion prices in the capital were touching nearly Rs 100/kg in retail markets, with prices across the country ranging from Rs 60-80/kg. While the import announcement from the Centre checked the rising price of the essential commodity, the Income Tax department's action could point to traders who were hoarding up on the fresh batch of imported products arriving in the country.

The first 2,000 tonnes of imported onions arrived in the country on the day of the Centre's announcement and two more import tenders were issued, which are to expire on November 14 and 18 respectively.

However, the state-owned MMTC, which was to import the onions has previously said that tenders for importing onions have not seen much response in earlier instances. As per the Centre's announcement, the imported onions are to be distributed by cooperative Nafed.

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