Kalighat Skywalk: Hawkers asked to shift to designated corner ‘in next one month’

Kolkata: The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) is gearing up to shift hawkers, who were moved to Jatin Das Park for Kalighat Skywalk project, to the special corner designated for them in the next one month.

The skywalk project is learnt to have neared its completion. The day of inauguration, it is expected, will be decided once Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee gives a green signal. In the meantime, Mayor Firhad Hakim along with other officials, including MMIC Parks and Gardens, Debashish Kumar who is also the MLA for Rashbehari Constituency, recently held a meeting to discuss the shifting plan of the hawkers who were temporarily shifted to Hazra Park for the project.

Sources said the civic body has given the hawkers one month’s time to shift to the special corner built for them which is a fully air-conditioned facility, assuming the appearance of a mall which will accommodate roughly 176 shops. It is expected that the hawkers would shift to this establishment by the first week of January. The hawkers though have no qualms about the shop spaces allotted to them, it was learnt that they demanded for installation of more doors.

Further, the decision of which hawker would get allotted which stall will be left to the hawkers committee and that the civic body will play no role in it. Once the hawkers shift to this new facility, KMC will begin demolishing the temporary stalls at the park.

This will also enable the next Durga Puja to be held at the Jatin Das Park.

Work for the skywalk had started in 2021 and had missed several deadlines that included July and August end too. The total cost involved in the construction has been to the tune of Rs 80 crore approximately.

The KMC leadership had earlier planned to inaugurate the skywalk on October 28 but that did not happen as work was yet to be completed. This time the civic body is hoping that the project will be inaugurated in February.