Women get a seat at the table to implement Mumbai hawkers’ policy

The move also marks an end of a ten-year saga for the civic administration to implement the Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending Act

Mumbai: The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Monday drew a lottery at its headquarters for reservation of women in the Town Vending Committee (TVC), who will participate in the implementation of hawker’s policy. Names of all women hawkers were presented of which three were picked. Its aim was to establish the TVC for the city and its seven administrative zones, and bring 32,415 authorised hawkers officially on board by issuing them licenses on August 31.

Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Monday drew a lottery at its headquarters for reservation of women in the Town Vending Committee. (Photo by Satish Bate/ Hindustan Times) (Satish Bate/HT PHOTO)

“This is the first time that a move to include women in the committee was made,” said Kiran Dighavkar, deputy municipal commissioner (special), additional charge, who chaired the lottery. “The seven zonal committees have representation from hawkers association, various departments of the BMC, traffic and police. Besides this, an Apex committee is chaired by the municipal commissioner.”

Each administrative zone has 20 members, of which eight are hawkers; going forward, three places of the eight will be taken by women. Dighavkar added that the purpose of the inclusivity was to find apt representation of women hawkers “as their issues are different”.

Welcoming BMC’s move of female representation in the committee, Nikhil Desai, member of TVC from Zone III said, “Women hawkers will now be better represented as they face different kinds of harassment from officers, who do not always want monetary favours. Such issues can be brought to the attention of the municipal commissioner in the TVC.”

The move also marks an end of a ten-year saga for the civic administration to implement the Street Vendors Livelihood and (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act of 2014.

So, why was the execution in a state of limbo? Dighavkar said, “To begin with, corporators asked for representation in the TVC, then the matter was pending in court, which was followed by then corporators opposing our hawking zones as they did not want them on their roads or wards. Thereafter, the pandemic struck, the corporators were disbanded, the code of conduct, followed by elections; now it is seeing the light of the day.”

Monday’s lottery also follows the Bombay high court’s directive to BMC. At a hearing on June 24, senior advocate SU Kamdar, representing the BMC, had informed the court that a returning officer had been appointed for the TVC elections, which are expected to be complete in eight weeks. The court had asked the BMC to complete it within four weeks.

On Monday, the draw was conducted in the presence of election returning officers appointed by the labour commissioner (Maharashtra) and Dighavkar. The lottery tickets were drawn by Vidhi Vinod Jadhav, a student of class 10 of a municipal school, as is BMC’s tradition.

Places are also reserved for scheduled tribes, minorities, other backward classes, the disabled and open categories.

The way forward

Dighavkar said a notification will be issued and election held for representation of hawkers for the seven zonal committees and the apex committee (TVC), after which a guideline for the implementation of the hawkers’ policy – issuing licences, forming hawking zones etc – will be done.

“The procedure should be complete by the last week of August. By the end of next month, 32,415 licenses will be issued, and hawking and non-hawking zones will be declared,” he added. This will end the civic administration’s ten-year struggle of legalizing hawkers.