No more mushrooms in Bhatkal; forest department clamps down on sale of wild caught mushrooms

Bhatkal 23 July 2018: (Bhatkallys News Bureau) People of Bhatkal have always had special liking for the Mushrooms during the monsoon season, with people queuing up to the local vendors, negotiating the prices with them competitively against the other buyers, being a regular scene. The scenes at Sunday markets and vegetable market downtown where these mushrooms as primarily sold, have changed drastically changed ever since the local department of Forest initiated a crackdown on the traders of mushrooms citing that the trade is carried out by illegally trespassing the land belonging to forest department. It all started in 2017 monsoon, when in a crackdown the forest officials raided the markets and seized the mushrooms from vendors, several times. [caption id="attachment_40142" align="alignnone" width="940"] A file photo of people queuing up to buy mushrooms in vegetable market Bhatkal[/caption] This season the trade of mushroom has seen downfall, and people who were queuing up for the seasonal mushrooms earlier have now been left craving for it. Speaking to Bhatkallys.com Ravi, a forest department official said "These mushrooms are food for some omnivorous animals, who depends on it during monsoon, and the trader illegally trespasses the forest area and plucks these mushroom for commercial purposes which is why we started raiding and seizing the seasonal food". However, a couple of time the mushrooms made its way into the markets this season but the high prices ranging between Rs. 800-1000 for 100 mushrooms saw comparatively less buyers. (Bhatkallys News Bureau/ Ismail Zaorez)