Juice & tea vendors hit hard due to COVID-19 lockdown in Guwahati

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The juice and tea vendors of the city are in distress due to their meagre daily earning amid the corona outbreak. "As the lockdown rules have been relaxed, I thought customers will visit my juice shop. But I was wrong," said Lalan Rai, a sugarcane juice seller from Chatribari.

Rai has been selling juice for the last 20 years. He said before the lockdown his daily income by selling juice was Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,500. But these days he is only being able to sell 5 to 10 glasses of juice.

Besides incurring losses due to declining sales, these vendors had to dispose the raw materials which they couldn't use due to the lockdown.

"This is kaccha karobar (business based on perishable materials). If we do not use our raw materials within three or four days then they get damaged. I incurred loss of around Rs 5,000 when the government announced the lockdown. Now I have been facing loss of Rs 400 to Rs 500 every day," added Rai.

Prabhat Kundu, a tea seller near the Nepali Mandir area in Paltan Bazar said that he is the only earner of his family. Kundu said that he was an egg seller but opened a tea shop two days before the lockdown was announced. "It has become harder for me to run my family without receiving any financial aid from the government. I am earning Rs 40 to Rs 50 these days. I cannot do anything but to wait for the lockdown to get over," added Kundu.