New Delhi: Street vendors and hawkers on Wednesday held a protest at Jantar Mantar, denouncing the authorities for their eviction and sweeping their wares off the streets, allegedly against the law.
The protesters demanded full implementation of the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014, which, they said, stipulates the formation of town vending committees and reserving two per cent of land for hawkers.
"This is not just an attack on hawkers, but on the Constitution of India. The 2014 Act was passed by Parliament to protect street vendors' right to livelihood, but the implementation of the act is not being done completely," National Hawkers Federation (NHF) general secretary Shaktimaan Ghosh told PTI.
The group has also written to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, flagging violation of the law.
Addressed to the joint secretaries of National Urban Livelihoods Mission (NULM) and Prime Minister Street Vendor's Atma Nirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) schemes, the letter claimed there were key gaps in the current survey process, and it excludes mobile vendors, and misuses enforcement powers to evict or penalise street vendors despite the legal protection.
"The federation demands that all harassment of vendors be stopped, that the role of Town Vending Committees be restored, and that weekly markets be formally recognised through a structured and participatory process. It further urged the Centre to form a national-level monitoring committee to oversee the implementation of the Act," the letter read.
Among the protestors was Mohammad, a cobbler who works near Minto Road. "In 2021, I paid Rs 500, but now in 2025, I paid a Rs 5,000 fine, I don't even know why," he said.
He also alleged that the enforcement team keeps seizing his belongings. "I always make sure there is no obstruction because of me. I wear a whistle so I can alert people when there's a crowd. I make sure I don't cause any jams."
Supreme Court advocate Kamlesh Kumar Mishra, who represents the NHF, said despite the hawkers' very real presence in our everyday life, they are deemed illegal.
"The primary grievance of street vendors relates to the implementation of the 2014 Act. To give a brief history, even though they have existed and all of us have used their services, in the eyes of the law, they were considered to be engaging in illegal activities," he said.
"The law says town vending committees should carry out surveys and make vending plans. But in 11 years, Delhi has not implemented vending plans in any area," he said. "Instead of planning, we are seeing bulldozer-style evictions. This is not how the law was meant to work."
Yakub Mohammed, general secretary of the Rajasthan branch of NHF, said, "The law says 2.5 per cent of land in all urban planning should be reserved for street vending. But land is being given to large corporations while vendors are being removed in the name of encroachment."
The federation said it plans to file a fresh petition in the Supreme Court and will hold a nationwide protest on November 24, which they will observe as Anti-Eviction Day.
"If proper surveys are not done and evictions are not stopped, we will keep fighting, both in court and on the ground," Ghosh said.