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Supplyco had activated five Onam Metro Fairs, nine district-level fairs and 67 Onam Markets at various places in the State.

Thiruvananthapuram , Sept. 8

MARKET intervention by the Kerala State Civil Supplies Corporation (Supplyco) has been able to hold prices during the ongoing season that peaked with the Thiru Onam day on Monday, according to the State Minister for Civil Supplies, Mr G. Karthikeyan.

Supplyco had set up, throughout the State, a string of minor and major Onam fairs, and had followed it up by reinforcing and revamping sales operations through the permanent outlets. This had effectively cut, right at the roots, any idea that unscrupulous elements may have harboured of hoarding stocks and artificially jacking up prices, the Minister said.

No incident involving an induced price spiral or shortage of any commodity have been reported in the State right through the entire duration of the 10-day-long festivities this season, the Minister said. This is squarely attributable to Supplyco's efficient market intervention operations, he added.

Supplyco had activated five Onam Metro Fairs, nine district-level fairs and 67 Onam Markets at various places in the State. This apart, operations at the 840 Maveli fair price shops, 93 Labham outlets, 21 mobile Maveli stores and 12 super markets were revamped and re-channelised. These efforts had helped liberally in the cause of reaching essential commodities with a discounting rate of up to 40 per cent to the common public. Even stationery items and typical Onam groceries also were marketed in this manner, he said.

All outlets opened to long queues of eager customers for the entire duration when they were open for business. This was indicative of the continued trust that the general public reposed in Supplyco and its way of doing business. Statistics available as at the end of September 7 (Sunday) were suggestive of a 40 per cent rise in turnover compared to that achieved during the last year.

Rs 50 lakh grant: The State Government has sanctioned an amount of Rs 50 lakh for the conduct of the Onam Week celebrations being carried out at the behest of district-level administration.

An official spokesman said here that the District Tourist Promotion Councils (DTPCs) in Thiruvananthapuram, Ernakulam, Thrissur and Kozhikode have each been granted Rs 2 lakh each while all other DTPCs were granted Rs 1 lakh each. This apart, the art and cultural festivities in the capital city, toned down this year citing a financial crisis, have been separately allocated Rs 32 lakh.

The Onam Week celebrations were kicked off in various centres on September 5 and will extend to Tuesday (September 10) while the cultural programmes at all the places started on September 6.

Onam doles: The State Government have given away Rs 38.62 crore to labourers in various sectors as special Onam give-aways, according to the Labour Commissioner, Mr S. Sreenivasan.

An official spokesman quoted him as saying that the 8,734 workers belonging to 46 closed factories in the State were given Rs 87.34 lakh, with each of them receiving Rs 1000. This apart, some 11,000-odd workers of 32 plantation estates that are lying closed received a handout of Rs 59.74 lakh, the spokesman added.

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