CHENNAI : Along with his four siblings, 10-year-old Abdul was brought to India from Rangoon by his father in 1962, who started a small automobile spare parts shop on the land along Cooum river which was allotted by the then-DMK government. After his father died, Abdul has taken over the shop at Pudupet and has been managing it for the past 55 years. But the place that is both home and workplace for Abdul and 91 other Burmese refugees will be cleared as part of Cooum River restoration project in a week.
This move which was taken to rejuvenate Cooum river by Chennai River Restoration Trust along with Greater Chennai Corporation, has mainly affected Burmese refugees who initially established this auto-repair hub in the early 1940s.The Public Works Department (PWD) has served eviction notices on 150-odd automobile spare parts shops located along South Cooum Road at Pudupet and the time period of two weeks given for vacating their shops ends on Monday.
All auto spare parts shops will be relocated to Auto Nagar, spread across 44 acres at Appur in Chengalpattu taluk of Kanchipuram District, which is being set-up at a cost of `19.64 crores as an alternate place to accommodate an auto-repair hub to replace Pudupet. Shop owners have been allotted plots of 350sqft and 650sqft, out of which 300 sqft will be free of cost and the rest is given to them at subsidised rates.
As this auto-repair hub, which is now at Central Chennai, will be relocated nearly 50 kilometres away from the city, shop owners are worried about losing their business altogether. “I cannot travel 100 kms every day when all my customers are in the heart of the city. I have four grandchildren who are studying and if my business shifts to Auto Nagar, what will happen to their education. This is a hasty decision taken by the government without much thought,” said Abdul Rasheed, owner of Hameed services who deals with six-wheeler spare parts.
Shop owners said that once these notices were served, most people started making arrangements to set-shop in other parts of the city like Poonamallee and Ambattur. “The entire market has started to disintegrate. They are scared that their customers will not travel so far to get just a light bulb or handlebar changed. I have also made arrangements to shift my goods to two godowns at Puzhal,” said S Najumudeen, another shop owner whose father was a refugee from Burma.
Also the affected shop owners are sceptical about the facilities at Auto Nagar, which is only an expanse of barren land surrounded by forest area where they have to build their shops from scratch. “There are no water or electricity connections, sanitation facilities or good roads at Auto Nagar. If officials had given more time to shift and provided these facilities at Appur, we would have relocated all the goods in our shops and stocked it there. Now, we have no space to store these even temporarily,” said Shahul Hameed, a Burmese refugee whose father relocated to India in 1953.
Locals said it will take another five years or more for the 2000-odd shops to recreate a market like Pudupet at Auto Nagar, as most traders are moving to other parts of the city during this shift. “Two-wheeler spare parts dealers and auto mechanics are largely affected during the eviction process as they are dependent on daily wages. But, officials have informed all three traders associations that our families will be accommodated at homes at Perumbakkam soon,” said Sagubar Saddique Ali, president of Motors, spare parts and merchants association.
Officials of PWD, which is the land owning authority along Cooum banks, said they have been sending representatives every day to shops at Pudupet to remind shop owners to speedup the eviction process. “We issued eviction notices in January 2018. We have given them ample time to vacate their shops. Only if they relocate to Appur, will there be any kind of development. According to a High Court order, we are supposed to allocate plots only for commercial purposes. Only slum clearance has to set-up other facilities,” they said.