HC asks BMC to ensure walkable footpaths for pedestrians

Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Monday reiterated that footpaths are meant for pedestrians including elderly and disabled people and asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to ensure that walkable footpaths are available by removing encroachments by unlicensed hawkers

Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Monday reiterated that footpaths are meant for pedestrians including elderly and disabled people and asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to ensure that walkable footpaths are available by removing encroachments by unlicensed hawkers.

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The HC also asked the civic body to file an affidavit identifying specific problems and indicating the solutions it would offer to deal with the issue.

The division bench of justice Gautam Patel and justice Neela Gokhale was hearing the petitions filed by two shopkeepers complaining of unauthorised hawkers setting up stalls outside their shops and littering the area, and sought directions to the BMC to find a permanent solution to the problem.

After hearing their contentions, the bench had widened the scope of the petition and included hawkers occupying footpaths and asked the BMC to inform it about the laws pertaining to footpaths and removal of encroachments.

The bench took note of the fact that there were authorised and unauthorised structures on footpaths which make it difficult for pedestrians to walk. The bench cited the example of the road near Bombay Gymkhana and said there was a need for signages informing people where to walk on roads which did not have footpaths.

“We are not interfering with the system. We want to ensure there are footpaths available for pedestrians which are actually walkable,” the bench remarked.

Senior advocate SU Kamdar for BMC informed the bench that many unauthorised and unlicensed hawkers were being removed and the civic body was taking steps to comply with the Supreme Court directions by constituting town vending committees under the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act 2014. The committee will identify and earmark specific hawking zones to address the issue of encroachments.

In response to an earlier query of the bench as to what was the policy for footpaths in hawking zones, Kamdar said that it was a difficult task to decide the size and width of footpaths within the demarcated hawking zones to ensure space for pedestrians. He submitted that the vendor committee will go through the issues.

After hearing the submissions, the bench noted, “You cannot have a one-size-fits-all approach. No further licence should be issued in that case...The right to grant licence also prescribes the right to take away licence in case of violations. We cannot have a situation where you cannot have power to cancel the licence.”

The bench also referred to the problems of paver blocks which keep coming out causing problems to pedestrians. “We do not know what the technical difficulties are but someone from the engineering department needs to look into this. Even senior citizens stumble despite walking with sticks. You (BMC) should make the footpath accessible,” the bench added, stressing on the need for making footpaths disabled and elderly friendly.

Urging the BMC to resolve the issue in a systematic manner, the bench asked Kamdar to file an affidavit in this regard and posted the matter for further hearing on March 3.