Did you have a tomato-free Sunday?

Tomatoes are selling across the country at around Rs 120 a kg today. In some places, it’s as high as Rs 250 a kg, but governments are selling them at a subsidy in others. For instance, in Delhi-NCR, the Centre said it will sell tomatoes at Rs 80 per kg from Sunday.

Which means, in most households, tomatoes are a precious commodity now. Be it a soup or a rasam or a tandoori gravy, no piece of tomato goes into it without careful thought. How did we come to this? 

The Federal has been following the issue with keen attention, and publishing some in-depth pieces on the shortage and the price hike. Here are some links, in case you missed reading the articles, or watching the videos, over the week.

Ground reports

Naveen Ammembala, our correspondent in Bengaluru, visited Kolar, the tomato-growing hub, to see first hand how and why things went wrong. It was journalism done the traditional way, and gave our readers an all-round view of Kolar’s economy dynamics, from farmers to middlemen to fertiliser sellers to gamblers to mafia. 

We published the ground report in five parts.

Part 1: Why tomato prices shot up in Kolar, and across India

Part 2: As tomato prices hot up, Kolar mafia laughs all the way to the bank

Part 3: How gamblers pull the strings to trigger rise in tomato prices at Kolar

Part 4: As Kolar farmers shift to other crops, tomato prices may shoot up again

Part 5: How KC Valley water turned the tide for tomato-growing farmers in Kolar

The videos can be viewed here and here, and here.

While the nation battles a food price hike, senior journalist TK Arun observed that it’s high time we took proactive measures to address seasonal inflation. With climate change a grim reality, we have to learn to make better use of the crops we harvest, he said here.

Where there is a crisis, spoofs can never be far behind. In Varanasi, a Samajwadi Party worker put out an elaborate video of hired bouncers ‘guarding’ the tomatoes from thieves and aggressively haggling buyers. The video went viral, with SP leader Akhilesh Yadav saying that at this rate, the produce should be given Z-Plus security.

In other places, tomatoes took centre stage in plots involving thieving, hijacks, road rages, and even birthday presents. 

The rest of us simply learned to cook with fewer tomatoes.