CHENNAI: Chennai Corporation Commissioner D Karthikeyan, who earned the displeasure of a division bench of the Madras High Court, appeared before the bench on Monday afternoon. When the matter came up for hearing in the morning, irked over the lethargic attitude of the civic body authorities, the bench of Justices M Sathyanarayanan and N Seshasayee, ordered the immediate appearance of Karthikeyan to explain the inaction over the hawking menace.
Accordingly, Karthikeyan appeared in the afternoon. The bench pointed out to him that the Corporation had failed to check the menace even after repeated orders. “We understand that the hawkers are downtrodden people and they do this for their livelihood.
But at least they must be regulated as per the provisions of the Street Vending Act,” the judges said. The court then directed the Commissioner to file a status report on the steps taken. Activist ‘Traffic’ K R Ramaswamy in his PIL prayed for a direction to the Commissioner to check hawking menace in East Mada Street in Mylapore and revoke the identity cards issued to the hawkers on NSC Bose Road at Esplanade.