15ft to 3ft: Hawkers retract stalls to free up road space

Kolkata: Hawkers who had captured nearly 15ft of Bertram Street retracted to just 3 ft on Saturday morning and reduced the height of display shelves at the rear from 9ft to 5ft but police refused to allow them to open their stalls until the Kolkata Municipal Corporation allowed them to do so.
Hawker stalls have been shut since Wednesday evening when Kolkata Police commissioner Vineet Goyal did a round of the area.On Friday, mayor Firhad Hakim along with ministers Aroop Biswas and Moloy Ghatak, the top cop and KMC commissioner Dhaval Jain had visited the area and asked hawker unions to reduce the stall and free up road space.

In other parts of the city, including Gariahat and Hatibagan, hawker unions acted voluntarily after word got around that they needed to toe the line or face eviction.
“I have asked all hawkers to restrict the stall size to 5ft × 3ft so that those who are displaced can be accommodated. I have also urged everyone to display goods on the stall platform and not erect shelves above it,” said Gariahat Indira Hawkers Union general secretary Debraj Ghosh.
At Hatibagan, too, hawker unions have asked stalls to reduce the display heights and also regulate the size of stalls. “We have asked hawkers to self-regulate because that is the need of the hour. We cannot flow against the tide,” said union leader Prabhat Das.
At New Market, where there are hawkers who are migrants from other states, the unions have decided to regulate and allow only those who have valid voter ID cards registered in Bengal. “The CM has raised a concern about hawking as a livelihood for local youths. We appreciate the sentiment and will ensure that outsiders do not take up hawking here,” said Hawkers’ Joint Action Union president Lakhi Nath Shaw.
He has also told hawkers to pack their goods and remove them from the site after business hours. “Goods will not stay dumped on the roads or pavements. We do not want the encroacher tag. It is true that on Bertram Street, the only hawking space is on the road but we have decided to restrict ourselves to just 3ft so that it does not inconvenience motorists or pedestrians,” said Sunny Shaw, another union leader.
Most hawkers along Bertram Street also said they wished to earn their living in harmony and denounced the actions of union leaders who heckled and manhandled traders at Humayun Place on Saturday. “I am sorry for what happened on Saturday. We cannot misbehave with customers or traders. We will not support hooliganism,” he said.