NEW DELHI: Close to 50 vendors were detained for a few hours at Mandir Marg Police Station on Friday afternoon, after they set up stalls on Mansingh Road. Police told them this was a no-vending zone. However, confusion prevails as the New Delhi Municipal Council-constituted Town Vending Committee is yet to conduct a survey of street vendors and identify if this is a no-vending zone.
These vendors used to hawk on India Gate lawns for decades, and after the Central Vista Project began, they would vend on the neighbouring streets. But on December 5, they were told to completely stop vending by Delhi Police when Russian President Vladimir Putin was visiting the city and told to return after Republic Day celebrations.
When the vendors tried to vend again on Ashoka Road and Mansingh Road after the Beating Retreat, they were shooed away by police, and told this was a no-vending zone. On Friday afternoon, about 45-47 vendors came together and started selling bhel/chaat, souvenirs, sunglasses, candy floss, on Mansingh Road pavement near the Rajpath intersection, behind the India Gate memorial.
They were backed by members of the National Hawkers Federation (NHF). Within 15 minutes, police reached the spot and told the vendors they can protest at Jantar Mantar but not until DDMA lifts its Covid curbs. “We empathise with you and want you to earn, but since the Vista project began, no one can vend here,” a senior official was seen telling them.
At that point, Sandeep Verma, Delhi Conveyor, NHF, drew the police’s attention to the Street Vendors Act, 2014, and quoted from Section 3.3 (no street vendor can be evicted/relocated till survey is conducted and certificate of vending is issued); Section 27 (prevention of harassment by police and other authority); and Section 6.4 (no eviction without prior formulation of rehabilitation).
Following this, the vendors continued to hawk for 20 minutes, till they were detained and their goods seized, and taken to the police station, accompanied by NHF members.
Verma told The Morning Standard: “The police are not acting by law. They have slapped Section 144 (gathering of four or more people prohibited) on us following DDMA’s Covid curbs around Central Vista. But these people are not ‘crowds’, they have been vending at India Gate for decades, and by this means could keep their home fires burning.” He further added: “The police also told me they agree that NDMC has not conducted the survey of any vendors and designated vending/no vending zones. If the authority has not done its duty, why are the vendors bearing the brunt? These vendors are authorised to vend here as the Street Vendors Act states that in case of rehabilitation, TVC must relocate vendors to the nearest vending zone.”
After their removal from India Gate lawns since March 2020 due to the pandemic lockdowns and construction of the Central Vista project, the vendors had dispersed across the adjoining areas of C-Hexagon (India Gate Circle) Akbar Road, Ashoka Road and Pandara Road. A couple of them even set makeshift shops inside the Vista enclosure selling tea, water, cigarettes to the construction workers here, but majority of the mobile vendors have not earned anything for two months now.
Sanjay Kumar Gupta, a disabled vendor from a juggi near Patiala Court, who sold pattices, burgers, sandwich, at India Gate lawns for 15 years, says “Most of us have been working in and around India gate all our lives and suddenly the police tells us this a no vending zone. I cannot a find a job in this pandemic because I am handicapped and uneducated. I have three small kids and don’t know how to make ends meet.”
The vendors have decided to once again set up shop outside Hyderabad House on Ashok Road today at 12 noon.