Of OMS queues and desperation
Soaring prices of essentials force more and more people to rely on subsidised goods
"I had to return home empty-handed the last time. I cannot afford to miss it again, because rice price is too much in the market."
Eighty-year-old Renu Bibi left home in the capital's Lalbagh before daybreak to queue up for subsidised rice and flour sold at a truck under the government's Open Market Sale programme.
Suffering from old-age complications, the frail woman trudged to the spot near Azimpur Agrani School, fearing that the line would be too long and the goods would be sold out before her turn.
"I had to return home empty-handed the last time. I cannot afford to miss it again, because rice price is too much in the market," she said.
By 7:00am, there were at least 150 people in the queue and Renu was somewhere in the middle. The mobile shop started selling the goods at 9:00pm and she was able to score a five-kg sack of rice and a two-kg pack of flour at Tk 198, about Tk 228 less than those at the regular grocery stores.
"These will last for five days and then I might have to come again. It's nothing but my misfortune that I had to come here at this age," said the widow.
Like Renu, thousands of low-income people in Dhaka scramble for essentials at OMS mobile shops as the prices continue to soar. Many return home empty-handed because the shops run out of goods fast.
The Directorate General of Food runs the OMS programme through its trucks and designated shops in 200 places across the capital.
Rice sells at Tk 30 a kg and flour at Tk 18 a kg. An individual can buy a maximum of 5 kg rice and 4 kg flour for Tk 222, which is less than half the price at the grocery stores.
From July 1 to November 10, the food ministry sold 2.92 lakh tonnes of rice and flour at subsidised prices.
According to a World Food Programme survey, 68 percent of the people in Bangladesh were struggling to buy food in August while 10 percent said they spent all of their savings buying food.
Compared to November last year, the prices of coarse rice rose by 7 percent and flour by 76 percent, according to the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh.
STRUGGLE FOR OMS GOODS
The Daily Star correspondents visited eight OMS shops in the capital over the last one week and found a large number of women, elderly people and youths in the queues.
Around 9:15am on Sunday, Kazi Shirin, who is six months into her pregnancy, came near Azimpur Agrani School only to find a queue of 200 people. Since returning from there would be a luxury she couldn't afford, she stood in the line for an hour. Then an employee of the shop noticed her condition and gave her the products.
Another woman named Aklima Khatun from Chankharpool area said she stood in a queue near Nilkhet intersection on November 23 and 24 to buy rice and flour, but she failed on both days.
In front of a shop In Kazipara last week, this correspondent saw a few men violently shoving each other for a place in the queue around 8:45am.
Noted economist Prof Selim Raihan said inflation put tremendous pressure on people with limited income since the beginning of this year and that's why the lines in front of the mobile shops were getting longer.
He added that the stocks of subsidised goods should be larger to meet the demand.
"I hope the policymakers will take measures considering the current situation," said Selim, the executive director of the South Asian Network on Economic Modelling.
Food Minister Sadhan Chandra Majumder and Food Secretary Ismiel Hossain are currently abroad. The Daily Star made several attempts to reach them on WhatsApp, but neither of them responded.