Hawkers in city to be surveyed before grant of licences

Kolkata: Officials from Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC), Kolkata Police and representatives from the Hawker Sangram Committee will jointly conduct a survey of hawkers in the city. The decision was taken at the meeting of the Town Vending Committee at KMC headquarters on Friday.

The committee has been formed by the state government to have a survey of hawkers in the city and issue licences to them, according to the West Bengal Urban Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Rules, 2018.

"The joint committee will soon start the survey and accordingly, we will come

up with the hawker policy," said Member, Mayor-in-

Council (Parking) Debasish Kumar, who chaired the meeting.

It may be mentioned that hawkers are banned from doing business on roads and are required to leave two-thirds of every pavement they occupy, to let pedestrians walk comfortably.

Kolkata Police had already done a survey of the hawkers. However, the Hawker

Sangram Committee had raised objections over the exercise and demanded their inclusion while conducting the survey.

"We expressed our inhibitions over the single party survey as we feel that there may be deprivation of a

section of hawkers," said

Saktiman Ghosh, president of the Hawker Sangram Committee.

The job of the Town Vending Committee will be to draw up a list of vending and no-vending zones. A no-vending zone would typically include a bus stop, a small pavement and a narrow street or lane.

"Road width, traffic flow and pedestrian movement in a particular area will be taken into consideration during the survey. It will take around five months to complete the process," Ghosh said.