New Delhi: Subhiksha in Sanskrit means “the giver of all good things in life”. Just don’t tell that to some vendors in the Capital’s largest wholesale market for fruit and vegetables, who allege that the no-frills discount retailer, Subhiksha Trading Services Ltd, hasn’t paid them their dues for the past several months.
As a result, many wholesale suppliers in Azadpur mandi, or market, say they have stopped supplying to various Subhiksha outlets in the National Capital Region (NCR) as Delhi and its environs are collectively called, after their payments were held up for anything between two and six months. As a rule, bulk buyers pay up suppliers within a month.
Click here to listen: National corporate editor Archna Shukla says the retail chain can ill-afford the fallout
A senior office bearer of Vegetable Traders Association of Azadpur put the amount due to suppliers at around Rs2 crore. He didn’t wish to be identified. At least half a dozen other fruit and vegetable sellers in the mandi, however, said it could be as high as Rs3 crore.
A trader, who did not wish to be named, said: “I will stop supplying to Subhiksha the day I recover my dues.” He claimed his outstanding against the firm was more than Rs30 lakh. “If I stop supplying to them, they may withhold my previous dues.”
A Subhiksha official, however, downplayed the issue.
“If you are doing business and someone’s payment is delayed, it could be for several reasons. It could be because of supply issues, quality issues, or billing issues,” said Ashu Phakey, president (Delhi region) at Subhiksha. He said he was unaware of the payment-related problem at Azadpur even as wholesalers maintained they called on him at his office as well as spoke to him on phone. “Since they are not organized kind of vendors, they, at times, have problem in being able to reconcile their accounts because they don’t operate with all the invoices…so some guys may have problems.”
Feeling the heat: Subhiksha MD R. Subramanian The discount retailer is facing a supply crunch in the NCR, with many wholesalers of fruit and vegetables stopping supplies to the firm over non-payment of dues. Harikrishna Katragadda / Mint
R. Subramanian, managing director of Subhiksha, said he was also unaware of such a problem at Azadpur. “We work in a completely decentralized system...we do not really handle payments to vendors centrally at all,” he said. However, he admitted that there are some “reconciliation issues” and said Subhiksha’s “team in Delhi was going through a large-scale reconciliation of accounts in Azadpur market”.
Mint couldn’t immediately ascertain whether alleged payment delays were restricted to NCR, or were broader.
But in NCR, many vendors, who have not been paid their dues, say they have stopped their supplies to the retailer.
Sujeet Kumar of Sujeet Ajeet and Co. said he stopped supplying to the retailer two months ago after unpaid dues amounted to around Rs25 lakh.