Kolkata: The Joint Traders’ Federation has called for a partial strike at city markets on January 17 till 3 pm and has placed several demands which include immediate implementation of The Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014.
The traders are to stage a demonstration on Tuesday. They put up posters and carried out a protest rally in the New Market area on Tuesday. Some of the demands included freeing of carriageways for fire brigade, ambulances and pedestrians. They demanded that the sizes of hawker stalls also need to be specified legally while ones doing hawking by flouting norms need to be removed by police and Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC).
The federation also demanded that at SS Hog Market, Chowringhee Traders Association, Firpos Market, City Mart, Bertram Street, Humayun Palace, and every other market, including at Lindsay Street, a 20-feet-area must be kept cleared on either side of the market gates for ease of consumers.
The demands also included that KMC and the police need to designate spaces for loading and unloading of goods at every market while ensuring no hawkers leave their goods tied to market walls with plastic at night. The federation also said that no politics should be played with the lives of hawkers but the KMC and police must act as per rules. They also demanded that in front and behind of KMC parking zones, there should be clear markings in yellow and a board must be installed displaying the parking fees.