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Home > News > Opinion News > Article > Dharmendra Jore Rule of HawKing law of land

Dharmendra Jore: Rule of HawKing > law of land

Updated on: 23 October,2017 06:13 AM IST  |  Mumbai
Dharmendra Jore | dharmendra.jore@mid-day.com

Unless the umbrella of political patronage is lifted, hawkers won't be legalised and it'll always be the common man bearing the brunt of the illegality

Dharmendra Jore: Rule of HawKing > law of land

Are cities expected to be hawker-free? Not really, because providing space for street vending to make it a win-win situation for both hawkers and consumers is a basic requirement in town planning. However, hawking has to be legal and regulated by law, ruthless in a manner, if need be, so that business on streets does not hamper pedestrian and vehicular traffic, or, in places like Mumbai, cause stampedes.


Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray had appropriated the issue of illegal hawking in view of the Elphinstone station stampede and given Indian Railways 15 days to remove vendors. The deadline ended on Saturday and Raj's threat materialised, as MNS workers were seen forcibly evicting hawkers from stations and crowded market areas.


MNS action overlapped with Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's (BMC's) decision of doubling penalty for illegal hawking. Unlike other days, the BMC and railways acted swiftly at major stations before MNS could launch its attack there, clearing station areas of hawkers who, later in the day, tried a comeback, unsuccessfully. However, stations beyond Mumbai, where MNS had taken action, saw almost every hawker back by late afternoon.


Nexus protects illegality
The system does come into play when it comes to checking the menace. People expect that hawking remain harmless, and legal as well as unauthorised vendors don't proliferate under a network that allows seamless operation in return for "protection money".

Mumbai has had this model running successfully for decades, thanks to politicians and their cronies operating on the streets, corrupt elements in civic ward offices, local police stations, government railway police and railway protection force.

The system is slammed only when an incident happens or political parties need to appropriate sizable votes that hawkers' families bring them. This time, tragic death of 23 commuters at Elphinstone Road station provided the trigger.

Though railway authorities have absolved themselves and hawkers in the incident, a majority of citizens haven't - Mumbaikars feel that illegal hawkers have already caused enough mayhem on public places, footpaths and station areas.

Raj, of course, has a political motive. He wants his action to win over hawker-affected people and, at the same time, corner political parties supported by the North Indian population, which constitutes a large chunk of street vendors. Congress, who had passed a national law to protect hawkers in 2014, sees MNS and BJP hand in glove in this.

The law that didn't work
UPA-II had come out with 'Street Vendors Act 2014', which calls for creating special hawking zones in cities. The legislation stipulates that hawkers be registered and given licences. It says that the number of hawkers should be 2.5% of the total population of a particular city. Hawkers' unions want at least 3 lakh hawkers in Mumbai, whereas official survey says the city has 1 lakh street vendors. Before the national act was legislated, the Maharashtra government had made hawkers' policies in 2003, 2007 and 2010. Policies are not mandatory to follow, but the law is.

Interestingly, the national law came into being following a Supreme Court directive, which asked for participation of vendors' representatives in Town Vending Committee (TVC), authorised to implement registration and local civic scheme, if any. The government did issue a circular, albeit late, in 2016 for forming a TVC, but it faced hurdles for not having any rules and scheme in place. Hawkers' unions then approached courts to get the government to work on formulating rules and a scheme.

In the meantime, however, authorities haven't been able to stop hawkers from spreading their tentacles. MMR and towns in the rest of Maharashtra face the same issue. Hawkers' unions, civic bodies and state government are now fighting it out in the high court.

Will double penalty work?
Doubling penalty, in some cases up to Rs 50,000, for illegal hawking is definitely a welcome move. Vendors will also pay a hefty amount for carting their confiscated goods. But the success of the new measure would rest entirely on the weak shoulders of the enforcement staff.

People wonder how hawkers know in advance that an anti-hawking party is about to raid them. But it's not rocket science. Hawkers pay protection money to local gangs that are patronised by local political leaders. The gangs have informants among civic officials and the police.

Complaints against illegal hawkers don't go beyond a point - either the complainant is threatened by local goons or officials responsible don't take action. Activists do petition top bosses in the BMC, but that too works fine only for a few days. Ward level officials religiously follow their boss's directives but don't follow it up with their juniors. Hawkers return to fortify their spots. Unauthorised shelters continue to come up. Pavements vanish and roads shrink. Mumbai sinks every day.

Dharmendra Jore is political editor, mid-day. He tweets @dharmendrajore. Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com

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