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Indian consumers fancy Chinese goods
BHAIRAHAWA, JAN 14 - The marketplaces in Bhairahawa take a different look every Sunday. Due to public holiday on the other side of the border, customers from various Indian cities inundate the markets here, and long queues of Indian vehicles, including those of government offices such as the Indian police, can be seen in major shopping areas.
And the attractions for those on their shopping sprees are none others but the relatively cheaper and quality Chinese goods available in the marketplaces.
Although the inflow of Indian customers is good in the evenings of other days as well,
Sunday is a special weekend day. For that day, customers from as far as Gorakhpur and Lucknow visit Bhairahawa for shopping.
"In fact, the major markets here have been sustaining due to the shopaholics who visit here from the other sides of the borders," said Fakkruddin Ahmed of Ayat-al-Jamil, a fancy store. According to him, customers coming from far-off Indian cities have Lumbini on their minds, which they visit earlier on, and return to their cities with goods, mostly Chinese brands.
The choices of Indian shoppers range from clothes to dolls and electronic appliances and electrical accessories that are mostly imported from China.
"Such Chinese goods are not available in our city, hence we come to Bhairahawa," said Chandra Mani Pandey, a shopper from the Indian city of Nautanwa across Sunauli in Nepal. He visited almost all the shops here with his family members.
As Pandey related, Chinese goods are not found in Nautanwa. During the visit of the scribes from The Kathmandu Post, most of the traders revealed that it was not very profitable for them to deal in Chinese products due to the additional transportation costs they have to bear while bringing these goods from Bhairahawa.
"Also processing these items through the customs is very difficult," they added.
Chinese goods, however, could be seen and acquired with relative ease in Gorakhpur. Nonetheless, customers there rather prefer to visit Bhairahawa for shopping.
"The competitive prices on the other side in Nepal are the main factor," said Chandreshwor Yadav, hailing from Gorakhpur.
Such trends in trans-border trade are not limited to Bhairahawa alone, according to traders here.
In the Birgunj-Raxaul and Nepalgunj-Rupedia sectors, among others, similar kinds of consumer behaviours are
visible. While Nepali customers visit the other side for Indian goods.
Frequently, Indian consumers go to as far as Butwal and Narayangarh for shopping. The traffic of Nepali consumers to Sunauli, interestingly, is equally high although Nepali consumer productions, mainly branded goods like those of Nepal Lever, are relatively cheaper here.
"The local consumers seem to overlook such advantages and follow the same traditional ways of shopping," according to traders.
However, the trend of buying bulk foodstuffs during a single visit for consumption for long periods has declined of late after revenue patrol tightened their checking and discouraged these practices, they added.
They further informed that businesses in Bhairahawa have declined following the shootouts of December 10 when frantic firing by security personnel resulted in the loss of life of an innocent woman. This has resulted in a decline in the arrival of Indian customers.
Said Yadu Paudel of Yogesh Enterprises, "The number of Indian consumers have dropped by some 25 percent following the December 10 incident. This has affected the businesses, mostly of those that deal in Chinese products, keeping in mind the preferences of Indian customers."
Nevertheless, optimism prevails in the markets here. Traders expressed hope that if the security situation improves to a satisfactory level, their business would be back to normalcy.
"After all, it’s the nature of the borderline trade. Till there exists free movement of people across the borders, the trans-border commerce will take no time to bounce back," they opined firmly.Posted on: 2004-01-15 04:07
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