MCD has initiated measures for survey of street vendors: Kejriwal

AAP administration in Delhi's MCD is surveying street vendors to allocate designated spaces, ensuring dignified working conditions, fulfilling pre-poll promise.

Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday said that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) administration in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has initiated measures to ensure a survey of street vendors in the Capital, and for the allocation of designated spaces for the vendors.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal. (PTI)

There are an estimated 400,000-500,000 street vendors and hawkers in Delhi. Kejriwal, who is also the AAP national convenor, said that the exercise will ensure dignified working conditions for these vendors in the city.

“We understand how difficult it is to work while setting up a street vending cart on the roadside. Street vendors are sometimes harassed... Those who set up shops on the streets come from extremely poor families. We have decided to conduct a survey of all the street vending shops to determine how many shopkeepers are in which area, their location, and types of shops. Arrangements will be made for them to set up their shops with dignity,” Kejriwal said at a press conference.

To be sure, the survey and identification of street vendors is mandated under The Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 and MCD has already undertaken the first phase of the exercise.

In December 2023, HT had reported that the second phase of the census will be undertaken. The overall exercise is expected to cost ₹2.2 crore.

Regularising activities of street vendors and setting up designated spots for them to operate was one of the ten pre-poll promises made by the AAP in the run up to the MCD polls in December 2022.

Kejriwal said the survey will take a few months to conclude. “Once complete, the vendors will be able to set up their shops without any hassle, and no one will be able to demand bribes from them,” he said.

However, the Bharatiya Janata Party accused the chief minister of misleading the people of Delhi.

“Hawkers are with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, having benefited from the Svanidhi scheme (a microcredit facility launched by the Centre, with which collateral-free loans up to ₹50,000 are given to street vendors), so Kejriwal is now trying to mislead hawkers and vendors… The BJP administration in the three (erstwhile) MCDs had finalised the Street Vendors Policy for hawkers, but last year the Aam Aadmi Party administration sat on the policy and did not carry forward the second survey,” Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva said.