Three morning markets are testing a no-plastic week. Cloth bags hang at the gate. A shopper who arrives without one can borrow a bag against a small deposit, returned when the bag comes back, washed or not. The committee decided washing was its own problem and not the shopper’s.
Stallholders were split. Fruit sellers, who use thin bags by the hundred, said the week will slow the queue. A grain seller who already uses paper said the week simply makes the others catch up. The committee kept the rule anyway and promised an extra helper at the gate for the first hour.
What happens next
By mid-morning on the first day the borrowed bags were all out. A second bundle arrived from a college that had stitched them as a project. They are uglier than the first set and just as useful.
The test ends Sunday. If the queue complaint is louder than the waste complaint, the committee has said it will keep the borrow-bag and drop the ban. That compromise was written down before the week began, so nobody can pretend it is a retreat invented on Saturday.
Taj Today will update this report if the official numbers or the timetable change. Related coverage stays on the Lifestyle page.
