Government told to find scheme for ‘no hawking zone’ by September 22

A case in point is the NSC Bose Road, which continues to be swamped by street hawkers despite both the Supreme Court and the Madras High Court directing the Corporation to maintain the entire stretch as ‘no hawking zone’. 

In view of the court orders being breached, ‘Traffic’ Ramaswamy, who was instrumental in filing a public interest litigation, moved contempt petitions at regular intervals prompting the high court to come up with directions to take necessary action and ensure the area is cleared of all encroachments and maintained as ‘no hawking zone’.

But then, though action permeates immediately after the direction, after a day or two and at times even within an hour, the traders are back with impunity setting up shops once again. Allegations are also there that the corporation and police authorities actually end up re-allocating the place to hawkers in spite of the previous hawkers being rehabilitated.

However, a recent contempt plea moved by Ramaswamy in this regard by submitting photographs of encroachments resulted in the first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice TS Sivaganam coming down heavily on the corporation and police officials. 

The bench said: “The problem remains the same. The authorities take action and the persons come back. It is not possible to have a policeman for each and every citizen. But the writ of police must run so that the persons once removed do not come back.” It also asked the government to devise a scheme by September 22 to ensure that no re-encroachment takes place. 

However, lack of political will and government apathy is said to be the reason behind the failure to do away with such encroachments for good. For many it’s a case of the hawkers’ livelihood and that no harm emanates from them while the very idea of pathways being meant for pedestrians does not seem to occur to many.