Mumbai: In the ongoing battle between the BMC and flower sellers of Matunga, the latter clearly gained the upper hand on Friday. They made a complete mockery of the BMC’s efforts to remove them from near Matunga post office. The BMC had bulldozed the stalls on Thursday morning, but by evening the sellers were back in business cocking a snook at the civic authority.
When the civic demolition squad returned on Friday morning, the hawkers physically prevented them from going ahead by squatting in front of the bull dozers. The presence of police made no difference to them. “The police and the civic officials looked like an impotent lot,” observed S. Kumar, a local citizen.
The BMC’s F-North ward office had evicted 52 illegal hawkers in the flower market at the junction of Telang Road and Bhandarkar Road. Action was also taken on the licensed flower stalls as the owners were encroaching fully on the footpaths causing great inconvenience to the public.
“We learnt that despite the eviction drive the stalls returned on Thursday evening. Thus on Friday morning we started another demolition drive. However, the hawkers protested, sat in front of the JCBs, forcing us to stop the demolition drive,” an officer from F-North ward said.
The officer added that the flower stalls owners have also taken illegal water connection and BMC will take action against that too. Notably, many flower stalls on Bhandarkar Road are licence holders, with permission to put 1×1 mtr stall on the street. But they have encroached the footpath, raised a floor to store materials and increased size of their stalls too. This has left no space on the footpath, forcing pedestrians to walk on the road, further causing traffic jams.
Speaking to the FPJ, a flower stall owner who has restarted his stall after demolition drive said, “We all are licence holders and doing business here from last 70 years. If BMC thinks we are encroaching, they should have given is advance notice instead of bringing in a JCB and demolishing our shops. We don’t accept this.”
The hawkers also questioned as why the ward office took action all of sudden when the feel the stalls are encroachments. “It seems some builder has pressurised the BMC. Was the ward office sleeping these many years,” asked a flower stalls owner on Bhandarkar Road.
Meanwhile, BJL MLA Tamil Selvan came out in support of the flower stall owners. Selvan who was present on the spot on Friday morning during hawkers protest against BMC’s demolition drive said that the civic body did not follow rules before taking action.
“The flower stalls owners are licence holders. The BMC should have issued them notice or called them to ward office for a meeting instead of directly demolishing the shops. This is a criminal act. I have mentioned this issue in the assembly session and also written to CM Devendra Fadnavis. This is injustice against licenced hawkers,” Selvan said speaking with the FPJ.
However, locals question Selvan’s interference in the matter when he does not represent the area. “Selvan is MLA from Sion-Kolivada, while the local MLA is Kalidas Kolamkar also of the BJP. Why is MLA Tamil Selvan taking interest and supporting the hawkers? He is supporting illegal activities. Many hawkers on Bhandarkar Road and Telang Road do not have licence and those who have they run their business as per their wishes, causing inconvenience to the public. It is the failure of the BMC that the hawkers restarted their business within hours. The hawkers seem to have more power than the BMC,” said local resident and activist Chetan Trivedi.
The BMC has started taking action against illegal hawkers and encroachments under its special drive from last two months. The anti-encroachment drive was launched under Additional Municipal Commissioner Ashwini Joshi, who has set a deadline of March 31 to clear all encroachments in the city. On F-North ward office’s failure to act against the unauthorised hawkers and encroachers in Matunga, Joshi told FPJ that she will look into the matter.
