Bengaluru: Banning the import and sale of Chinese firecrackers has had little or no effect on the sale of locally-made crackers, as traders reported poor business caused by anti-cracker campaigns by schools, resident welfare associations and others. This was noted in a survey done by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India. The survey was conducted among firecracker wholesalers, retailers and traders in 10 cities, including Bengaluru, Delhi and Mumbai to gauge the demand for firecrackers, as well as the impact of the ban on Chinese crackers.
“It is not just Chinese crackers, but multiple factors, like growing awareness, rising cost of living, growing tendency amid people to save their hard-earned money rather than squander it on burning crackers, paucity of time, traffic congestion during the festive period… all this and other reasons have dented this business over the years,” said the majority of the firecracker traders.
Most traders said they have seen a decline of about 20% a year in sales for the past five years and have almost halved their orders. “Over the last few years, our entire merchandise usually has only around 5% to 10% of Chinese-made firecrackers and this year since they are banned, all our merchandise are only domestically manufactured. The cracker business has drastically come down by around 20-30% each year due to awareness programmes,” said Manu Jain, a registered cracker dealer in Koramangala.
Last year, he stocked Rs 20 lakh worth of firecrackers. He burnt his fingers as it rained for four days and business was not up to the mark. “This year, I included last year’s stock with the present stock, which amounts to only a little over '15 lakh. There was a delay in issuing fire-cracker licence this year due to unknown reasons and we have only three days to run the show,” he said.
No noise, please
Firecracker dealer Manu Jain also stated that this year, his customers preferred sparklers, flowerpots and chakras to high-decibel firecrackers.
