The Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) finally wielded the axe on the street vendors at SS Road – the stretch from MG Road to Goenka Point – putting an end to a 55 year old “hawkers’ market” in Fancy Bazar last Thursday.
As per the Gauhati High Court order that came in favor of GMC last year, after a two-year long legal battle to evict the vendors of SS Road, the GMC had, on Thursday, conducted an eviction drive relocating 230 vendors to the GMC multi-storey market in Fancy Bazar.
The vendors that mostly comprise cloth and clothes sellers, however, expressed dissatisfaction with the arrangement and lead a strong protest demanding a better arrangement for relocation.
“We will continue selling our products on SS Road if we are not relocated somewhere better,” Prantosh Kundu, a seller there, told G Plus.
The Gauhati High Court had asked GMC to evict the road by March 31, and according to GMC officials, they had instructed the vendors to vacate in several instances failing which, this eviction drive had to be undertaken.
The vendors opined that the GMC market is not suited for cloth business and it will not be beneficial for their business if they relocate.
“The market is good for vegetable sellers and not for those who sell clothes. We have to display our products and in the shop, there is just enough space just to display 20-30 items at a time. Moreover, the area is not clean and no customer will be attracted to visit the market,” Kundu added.
The GMC market that was shut down in 1997 after a massive fire gutted it was reopened in 2013 and has been used as a vegetable market for the last five years. Recently, the third and fourth floors of the market have been renovated to accommodate the SS Road vendors.
“Due to the vegetable market below, it is mostly unclean and stinks a lot. No customer of ours will come here,” Durlobh Sarma, a vendor said.
If evicted, the vendors are poised to lose their livelihood, Greater Guwahati Hawkers’ Association said.
“The GMC market does not have enough space to accommodate all the sellers. Also, most of the sellers live in a hand-to-mouth condition. A drop in their profit margins will render them jobless,” Uday Ghosh, president of GGHA said.
The SS Road market is about half a century old, the vendors said. It started in the 1960s with the setting up of a few make-shift shops over a stretch of patta land beside the road and has grown over the last five decades to an extent that almost the entire street has been encroached by the sellers.
“My father set up his shop in the 60’s. He manned the shop for about 23 years and then I took charge. He paid for my education and my sisters’ marriage with the money earned from this shop. I’ve been running this shop for more than 35 years. My sons are in college and daughter is in school. This shop had fed two generations of my family and all of a sudden, with one decision, the GMC has taken away my means of income. I am not going to vacate until my earnings are ensured,” Probal Ghosh, a vendor in his late fifties, said.
The vendors shared that they achieved a sale of about Rs 3,000-Rs 4,000 daily.
Buyers express mixed feeling regarding the eviction
While a majority of buyers in Fancy Bazar welcomed the eviction drive, there is a section who termed the move as “uncalled for.”
“Traffic jams are decades-old problem in Fancy Bazar. One of the reasons is that almost all the major roads are encroached by roadside vendors. Eviction on SS Road is a good start. Now, commuters can use this road too. This will relieve much of the load from the other commutable roads,” Lalit Sahani, a shopper in Fancy Bazar said.
Another shopper, Parvez Khan said, “If this move helps to ease the traffic problem, then it should be welcomed. The streets are no places to set up shops.”
Many, however, expressed concern on the safety and security of the commuters if the shops were closed.
“There are no streetlights on the road. The street is lit by the shops. It is these shops that keep the region bustling with activity. If these shops are shut down, the road will be unsafe for commuters,” Neha Sarma, another shopper said.
Several others too echoed Sarma’s concern expressing that with night, darkness descends on the adjacent lanes of Fancy Bazar such as the SRCB Road and the Kumarpara Road.
Another shopper, Rita Kakati, said that these shops sell a certain category of clothes which are cheap and durable and are over-priced in other shops.
“There is a difference of Rs 30-40 between the roadside clothes and those sold in shops. These shops maintain the balance in the market. I am not against clearing the SS Road, but the government must make sure that these shops survive,” Kakati said.
The permanent shopkeepers along the SS Road, however, voiced that the move was necessary.
“They can afford to sell at a much lesser rate as they don’t have any establishment cost involved. They don’t have to maintain stocks and pay employees like us. That could also be tolerated but encroaching the roads in front of our shops is not acceptable. It is good that these shops are being relocated. Now, those who buy from the footpaths will go there and for quality products, they will come to our shops,” a seller, under condition of anonymity, said.
You cannot satisfy everyone: GMC
On the discontentment of the evicted vendors GMC said that the eviction is a court mandated act and everyone cannot be satisfied.
To make the SS Road commutable was decades old problem for Fancy Bazar and had been on the agenda of GMC for a long time. In a judgment in 2011, the Gauhati High Court verdict came in favour of GMC and gave it the right to evict those vendors who had encroached the roads. But, according to the National Policy on Urban Street Vendors, 2009 and the Street Vendors Act, 2014, street vendors cannot be evicted but relocated to a government designated vending zone.
“We have relocated them to a GMC market where they can continue their business. The third and fourth floors have also been refurbished for the same. GMC is also planning on making parking facilities there as well. If they (vendors) are not satisfied with arrangement, then nothing can be done about it. You cannot satisfy everyone,” additional commissioner of GMC, Deba Kumar Mishra told G Plus.
Regarding the corporation’s plan with the SS Road, Mishra said, “The road will serve the purpose for which it was built in the first place – for commuting. This will take off the traffic load from Fancy Bazar to a fair extent. The roads will be well lit and be well maintained.”