After a week long spell of heavy rains which dampened sales of wholesale firecrackers, the city police has dealt another blow to businesses in Hyderabad by not giving out new temporary permit licenses to those interested in selling crackers in retail.
“We are trying to minimise the number of retail stalls selling fire crackers this year in the city. Permission to set up shops are being given only to those persons who had set up stalls last year. New comers are not being given permission,” informed Jaya Lakshmi, deputy commissioner of police, north zone.
VB Kamalasan Reddy, deputy commissioner of police, central zone, also mentioned that due to space constraints in the city, it was not possible to give permission to new temporary cracker stalls. “If we start giving permission to everyone, then there will be a stall in every nook and corner in the city,” he said.
Heartening as it may seem that these precautions are being thought of, it means a bad loss for retailers. The situation has in fact only worsened since last year, when the sales had receded. “You can find a lot of illegal shops here and there, but nobody will go and tell them to leave. The police will check only legal shops, and will leave the illegal ones alone,” alleged Shanti Bhope, owner of Shanti Fireworks, which is situated at Siddiamber Bazar.