CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu government is mulling an alternative market similar to the one in Koyambedu in Southern Chennai. It is learnt that two pieces of land including one in Potheri and one in Kilambakkam have been recently inspected by top officials as possible sites for the new market.
This comes as 60 per cent of vehicles carrying vegetables are entering Koyambedu through Tambaram, said an official. "Rather than congesting the city with these vehicles, we are thinking of alternative avenues like opening up a new market in South Chennai," he added.
This would also cater to traders in Tambaram as well as people in South Chennai who are totally dependent on the Koyambedu market thus decongesting it, said the official.
He said this is in the planning stage only and no decision has been taken yet. Interestingly, such a plan was mooted by city planners three years ago but it was dropped after the consultant conducted a feasibility study for identifying commercially viable projects, including a market, on land near Nandhiavaram village in Guduvanchery.
Meanwhile, the livelihoods of more than 3,500 traders of the Koyambedu wholesale vegetable and fruits market are at stake as the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority has failed to find an alternate site to help them resume their business for the last two months.
The traders, bitter at being ignored by the Market Management Committee (MMC) on Monday, gathered in front of the MMC building urging the chief administrative officer to either open up the locked Koyambedu wholesale market or provide them with an alternative site.
Fretting that the MMC and CMDA catered to only 400 wholesale traders in both fruit and vegetable markets, the traders said that they have been ignored for the last two months with the government hardly bothering about their livelihoods.
Kai Kani Malar Angadi Vyabarigal Nala Sangam general secretary and Koyambedu Foodgrains Market President D Manivannan told The New Indian Express that more than two months have passed and the officials are ignoring their plight. "It is time the government intervenes and unlocks the Koyambedu market to resume trade while prescribing standard operating procedures," said Manivannan.
He said markets in Delhi and other cities have been opened and the government should take a leaf from that and allow the opening of the Koyambedu wholesale market by placing restrictions. "If they are harping on social distancing, how did they allow 200 shops to function in less than 7 acres of land in Madhavaram," he reasoned.
SR Kannan, another fruit trader from the Koyambedu wholesale market, says neither is the government allotting an alternative site as they promised prior to shutting the Koyambedu market nor reopening it. "This has impacted our lives. I don't have money for my daily needs. While others are getting government doles for loss of business, fruit and vegetable traders don't have any support system," he rued.
Interestingly, vegetable traders in Thirumazhisai as well as fruit traders in Madhavaram are also not happy with the alternative site being provided to them and have been demanding that the Koyambedu market be opened. "During the rains, the entire site gets inundated and we have difficulty in loading and unloading," says a trader.
Traders allege the entire process of shifting the market to other sites was a thoughtless exercise and a waste of money. "Without coming out with a roadmap or taking the traders into confidence, it was done hurriedly," said Kannan.
In Madhavaram, CMDA officials accommodated 250 traders in a limited space. After being rapped by the Chief Secretary for not applying their mind in allocating space for traders, now the officials who planned to shift part of them to the first floor are caught in a fix as traders are refusing to move there stating that during the rains, the entire area gets drenched.