Mumbai, March 5: With just days remaining for the festive holi celebrations, prices of sprinklers and water guns are expected to rise by up to 20 percent. Since most of the Indian wholesale traders import these products from China, the price of sprinklers are expected to rise by atleast 15-20 percent.

According to a data, India imports 90 percent of Holi related water toys from China. However, this year the imports and exports from China have been hit due to global epidemic noval coronavirus. Not only finished products, India also imports raw materials from China for Holi festival, which are futher manufactured in the Indian factories and then sold in the local markets. Coronavirus Outbreak in India: Rashtrapati Bhavan Cancels All Holi Gatherings Due to COVID-19, Tweets President Ram Nath Kovind.

As confusions regarding the imports of sprinklers and water guns have gripped the Indian wholesale market, Tradeindia.com COO Sandip Chhetri said thay have witnessed 127 percent hike in inquiries related to Holi products as compared to last year.

Adding more, he said, "The the demand for organic products on its platform has increased by 23 percent in Metro cities. While large distributors have already placed their orders in advance in November, much before the virus outbreak, it is the small traders whose sales would suffer more. Manufacturers are planning to increase the price of products by 15-20 per cent as demand is more than supply."

Apart from this, retail players believe the supply of goods and raw material will continue to take a hit for retailers. Looking at the present condition, overall domestic demand is lukewarm as consumers too are cautious. Most of the prospective consumers even don't want to play holi, citing coronavirus outbreak.

It is to be known that globally at least 3,283 people have been killed due to noval coronavirus, while over 95,000 are affected. In China alone, more that 3,012 people had died, while 80,409 cases had been confirmed. In India, the count of total positive cases of nCoV detected in the country has risen to 30.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 05, 2020 07:10 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).