Floating market woos tourists to Dal Lake

Dwellers use shikaras to market their produce

Cultivation of vegetables in Dal Lake has been going on for centuries

The floating vegetable market in the world famous Dal Lake in Srinagar has become one of the main attractions for tourists coming to the city. The hustle and bustle in the floating market, one among the world’s five, starts much before dawn. The only way to get to the market inside the lake is on a shikara (boat) and that too before dawn, as vegetables are sold for just two hours from 5 am.

The vegetable market was not functioning for several months after last September's devastating floods damaged the crops. Now, it is slowly back as one can see the Dal dwellers again paddling boats laden with vegetables in the floating market. From here it is supplied to most parts of the city and other towns of the Valley. Vegetables are organic and picked only hours before they are sold.

For Sandeep and Neha, a couple from Delhi, waking up at 4 am to take a shikara ride towards the floating vegetable market did not sound interesting, at first. “The otherwise overcrowded Boulevard Lane was empty and thousands of shikaras that remained yoked to the shore had vanished when we woke up at 4 am. We had booked a shikara in advance and met up at a certain point,” Sandeep told Deccan Herald.

While exploring the floating market, he said, “We also got to see the little alleys and canals lined with trees inside the lake. The old but attractive wooden shops and houses with small gardens are something you couldn’t have imagined or foreseen from outside the lake.

The ride back was another lovely experience. As sun was rising we could see beautiful lotus plants in the lake; their wide green leaves holding shimmering droplets of dew glistening in the early morning rays,” he added. The government rate for shikara ride is Rs 500 per hour but they would ask a lot more in the wee hours from tourists. They ask between Rs 800 and Rs 1200 but one can bargain it for Rs 500 to 600, which is a good deal.

Illegal houses

Vegetables cultivated in the gardens in the lake are supplied to nearly half of the Srinagar city. However, most of the floating vegetable gardens which dot the lake have choked it. A person, usually the one who has the ownership of the water or has an illegal house, fences a strip of the water by planting wooden pillars in water and filling the gap between the pillars with a weed that grows in the lake.  After some time the weed takes root making an effective underwater wall web.

According to unofficial figures, more than 1,200 acres, which surround the lake, are used for cultivating vegetables and they yield lakhs in revenue to the growers, most of whom are Dal dwellers. About 44,000 people are associated with this trade who were rendered jobless and without business after the last year’s floods.

Being rich in nutrients, this land is ideal for growing vegetables and the residents make the most of it. “The floating gardens have been quite common in city lakes, especially on the Dal in the past. They used to produce an abundant crop of cucumber and melon as has been stated in Gazetteer of Kashmir Ladakh published in 1880. Watermelons and a number of vegetables were also cultivated on floating gardens during the period of Mughal,” said Abdul Rehman, a grower.

Septuagenarian Rehman, who boasts of completing his degree in 70s, quoting “A History of Kashmir” says the watermelons of Kashmir were so popular that Mughal emperors had taken them to Agra for their table use. “There it is written that cultivation of vegetables on floating gardens was extensively carried out during the Sikh regime (1819-1846),” he said.

 Rehman’s views are corroborated in Sir W R Lawrence’s book “The Valley of Kashmir” which mentions about the floating gardens in Dal Lake as well as lilies of various colours and queen of all these species. In the book, there is also a mention about the manner by which the floating gardens were formed.

 Floating gardens produce a number of vegetables like cucumber, pumpkins as well as melons. While growing vegetables in the lake has started again after last year’s deluge, growers say, it will take at least a year before nadur or the lotus stem, a delicacy in Kashmir, will grow.

The floating vegetable markets, which were a major tourist attraction earlier, are somewhat losing their sheen due the higher levels of water which have seeped into the vegetable patches, making them unsuitable for cultivation.

 Growers claim it was for the first time in about 300 years that this market did not witness trading due to the floods. The vegetable lands inside Dal remained under flood waters till April this year.

  “First it was floods and then the excessive rainfall in February and March. The September 2014 flood inundated vegetable lands and the demarcations used to grow lotus stems. The water remained there for almost three months and when the water level receded, growers started sowing seeds for the next season,” says Mushtaq Ahmad Dar, a grower.

“But due to heavy rainfall the seeds for nadur were dispersed. And that dream too was washed away. Now we are not left with any kind of seeds to support us for future,” he added.

An official of the state agriculture department said the sale records of this market aren’t available, as it has been officially banned by the High Court, for being one of the major pollutants of Dal Lake.

  Besides vegetables, one can find shops selling clothes, shawls, handicrafts and other items. Also, kesar and spices are sold in shops and shikaras throughout the day.

 The other floating markets in the world are Damnoen Saduak floating market in Ratchaburi, Thailand,floating market in the Solomon Islands, Bangkok’s Taling Chan floating market, floating markets at Mekong Delta, Vietnam, and one in Kerala.