Finer lentil and chicken became pricier in the last seven days in the city compounding woes of the consumers further.
Prices of finer lentil, both of local and imported Nepalese varieties, increased by Tk 10-20 per kilogram at retail and was selling at Tk 120-130 a kg on Thursday.
Some grocers with earlier stock were seen selling these essential items at Tk 110-120 a kg.
Harunur Rashid, a grocer at Katashur in Mohammadpur told the FE that the price of a sack containing 50-kilogramme slim lentil increased to Tk 4,750-4,800 from Tk 4,250-4,300 a week back at major wholesale markets.
He said traders were raising prices ahead of Eid-ul-Fitr, the biggest religious festival of Muslims, to make windfall profits.
Contacted, Mominur Rahman, a Maulabibazar wholesale market-based pulse trader, said that local production of lentil in Jashore, Narail and other districts dropped this year.
"On the other hand, import of Nepalese lentil has been stopped for last few days which have caused a rise in price by a little margin," he said.
But the retailers are charging much higher prices than that of the wholesale markets, he claimed.
He said Nepalese lentil was sold at Tk 93 a kg at Maulabibazar on Wednesday evening which was traded at Tk 120 at groceries on Thursday.
The country produces 0.25 million tonnes of lentil annually against a demand of more than 1.2 million tonnes.
Bangladesh produces only finer variety of lentil and also imports this variety of the pulse from Nepal, a neighbour.
The country imports coarse lentil from Australia, India and other countries.
However, prices of coarse lentil remained static at Tk 60- 70 a kg last week.
Prices of broiler and sonali chicken, two main sources of protein for the country's consumers, increased further last week by Tk 10-20 a kg.
Broiler was selling at Tk 150-160 and sonali (known as Pakistani) at Tk 300-350 a kg on the day.
