Traders of Walled City fear huge drop in sales; labourers badly affected

Ever since the decision to demonetise the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes have been announced, traders of Old Delhi are fearing a huge drop in sales.  

They also fear that the situation will not improve in the coming months and it will add to their losses. The worst affected are the owners who have their shops at Chawri Bazaar and Dariba Kalan areas.  

These two areas of Old Delhi are famous for wholesale selling of hardware items like doors and window fittings, wedding cards, jewellery and brass items. Most of the traders in the areas have shut their shops for three to four days now due to fear of raids by income tax officers. 

Though the closure of shops on Monday was attributed to celebration of Gurupurab which is a public holiday, some traders who had opened their shops mentioned that there is also fear of the officers. This is causing various traders to keep their shops closed. 

The traders also mention that it is not the only the trader community of the area which will be affected by the drop in sales but also the poor coolies whose source of livelihood depends only on the money earned by him in picking and transferring the load.  

Manu Sharma, a wholesale trader at Chawri Bazaar said: “There is a huge drop in customers coming to buy items. About 90 per cent of our customers pay through cash and ever since Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes have been scrapped by the government, there is just no change.”

Sharma further added: “Forget the traders. A coolie is only dependent upon the load which he picks and transfers on that particular day. With no business, it will not only be the rich but also the poor who will be affected.”

When asked why most of the traders in the area were not doing transactions through credit cards/debit cards, Ram Aggarwal, a trader at Dariba Kalan observed: “As it is mostly wholesale traders over here who operate with a very thin margin, we never required such modes of transaction. Moreover, I think the usage of credit/debit cards will further affect profits.”