Durga Puja: Fancy Bazaar Wears Deserted Look Amid COVID-19 Pandemic

With the festive fervour of Durga Puja, the market gets flooded with different varieties of new trends of all sorts, and be it Fancy Bazaar or shopping malls the customers rushed to grab their choice before the stock gets over.

But this time, the COVID-19 pandemic has gripped away the enthusiasm of the people and the markets are affected as people are scared to go to markets for puja shopping. On the one hand, there is COVID-19 pandemic and on the other the online shopping has also attracted the customers hampering the physical markets.

With the growing numbers of online shopping portal with various products available from household products to clothes to accessories it has become easier for the people for shopping rather than to go to market by spending the valuable time.

The Fancy Bazaar market which was fully crowded during the festivals a few years back wore a deserted look this year amid the COVID-19 pandemic and with the changing trend of shopping online. "The market has fallen down this year due to the pandemic. People don't like to come to the market fearing of getting infected with the virus. In the last 10, days we don't have even one customer. From today there are one or two customers which we got in the entire day. The market has also been affected with the ongoing strike of motor transport association as it has become difficult for the people to commute," said a shopkeeper who owns a garment shop.

Moreover, the trend of online shopping has increased. Earlier, people only opted for fancy bazaar for shopping and we have fixed customers from across the state who come for shopping during the festivals like Bihu, Durga Puja or Eid but now-a-days we have lost such customers as they don't take the pain to come all the way to Guwahati for shopping, the shopkeeper added.

Another shopkeeper Mukesh said that by this time when only 10-12 days left for puja we don't even have time to respond to different customers at a time but this year we have to call the customers. "We are really surprised that the business has fallen down so much that we are not getting even our regular customers. Till last year we have at least 30-40 permanent customers who used to come only for the salwar suits and Babu Bazaar which was famous for salwar suits and sarees have now wore a deserted look as customers go for online shopping," said Mukesh.