Colaba Causeway hawkers back in 48 hours after BMC drive before PM visit

MUMBAI: Forty-eight hours after prime minister Narendra Modi’s visit, the hawkers of Colaba Causeway, who were driven out by the BMC, have returned in full force much to the frustration of local residents

MUMBAI: Forty-eight hours after prime minister Narendra Modi’s visit, the hawkers of Colaba Causeway, who were driven out by the BMC, have returned in full force much to the frustration of local residents.

Colaba Causeway hawkers back in 48 hours after BMC drive before PM visit

“The BMC only takes swift action to remove hawkers during visits by the PM or other central ministers,” said a resident. Notably, Colaba Causeway is included in a list of 20 locations submitted by the civic body to the Bombay high court where hawker removal is being considered.

Subhash Motwani, president of the Clean Heritage Colaba Residents’ Association, clarified that the residents were not against the hawkers earning a living. “But they should be relocated to a hawkers’ plaza where they do not hinder us from using footpaths and pedestrian areas,” he said.

Elaborating on the subject, Motwani claimed that the barrier to action being taken was not the hawkers but the authorities themselves. “A lot of money has been exchanged for letting out these spaces for hawking,” he claimed. “They are even violating the high court guidelines. Only when the PM or a minister from the central government arrives does the BMC clear stalls overnight on a war footing. When regular citizens ask for their removal, the request falls on deaf ears.”

Motwani explained that if the hawkers were cleared off footpaths, multiple problems would get resolved in one go. “The traffic will ease and noise pollution will reduce because people walking on the roads will not be honked at,” he said. “Traffic congestion and the risk of accidents too will go down and air quality will improve.”

Pervez Cooper, another Colaba resident, said that the hawkers in the area had clandestinely increased from 76 to 186 thanks to the BMC and the police. “All the committees set up to ostensibly tackle this are bogus,” he said. “I have seen policemen in stationed vans being paid haftas. If they are being paid on a daily basis, why would they pick them up?”

Cooper, who has lived in the area for over 35 years, said that Colaba had become unliveable. “We cannot drive our own cars due to the hawkers who are doing roaring business,” he said. “We have offered a solution to the BMC: shift them to the Museum site exactly opposite Regal Cinema where the Maharashtra police headquarters are.”

When a civic official from A ward was contacted, he said the hawkers were removed during the PM’s visit from the security point of view and due to police orders. “We only allow surveyed, licensed hawkers to hawk there,” he claimed. “We do not allow illegal hawkers. But we have submitted a proposal to the high court to make this area hawker-free.”