Street Vending

Street vending or hawking is one of the important means of earning a livelihood for the work force in the city. Estimates show that about 66 percent of the city’s work force is involved in informal sector and a sizable proportion among them constitutes unorganised retail traders. Of these, a significant section comprises street vendors or hawkers. Estimates show that Chennai has about 1.25 lakh street vendors or hawkers. They are found in every busy location and road/street in all over the city. However, the presence of large numbers of street vendors or hawkers has become a contentious issue. Truly, hawking on road margins, pavements, pedestrian sub-ways and foot over bridges leads to congestion and overcrowding. In many areas footpaths are almost lost to the hawkers. Increasingly, pedestrians are finding to their dismay that the space meant for them is only shrinking. Besides eating into carriage/pedestrian way, the hawkers often dump garbage in the areas where they carry on their trade, creating nuisance to the public. Sometimes, when hawkers appropriate so much space for themselves they do become more of an impediment/ irritant than a convenience. In many areas the shopkeepers keep their fingers crossed as their shops are becoming unapproachable and often invisible for the customers. There has been a long-running battle between street vendors, shopkeepers and pedestrians in all the cities/ towns all over the country over encroachment of roadsides and pavements by hawkers. In fact, trade wars between shopkeepers and hawkers take place very frequently in different places in the cities/towns all over the country. As residents’ associations as well as shopkeepers associations become more powerful, there is growing pressure on local municipal offices and police to tackle “the hawker menace.” But the hawkers have the support of local politicians and goons, who receive “mamool” from the hawkers. The hawkers say that the shopkeepers, including big ones, also obstruct traffic flow and pedestrian movements by spreading their wares on pavements and road margins. Besides, according to them, the greatest cause of obstruction to traffic flow, inconvenience to commuters, nuisance to shopkeepers, and hindrance to street vendors themselves is caused by encroachment of road margins and pavement by parking (legal as well as illegal) of trucks, cars, motorbikes, scooters, even in busy roads and nearby markets in the cities/towns. At present, street vending or hawking is an integral part of urban life in Indian cities/towns. Various studies have already confirmed the fact that street vendors comprise one of the most marginalised sections of the urban poor. What was a sporadic activity found near the railway stations, bus stands, markets and other busy localities, today street vending is institutionaslised in every part of the cities and towns all over India. In fact, one can rarely find a road, street, lane or public place without the presence of hawkers. Experts say that as long as people are unable to get better jobs with higher remuneration in the formal sector, they will continue to fall back to street vending or hawking as a profession/activity to eke out their livelihood. No doubt, the presence of large number street vendors create numerous problems for the civic authorities, traffic police, vehicle users, shopkeepers, pedestrians and the general public. But it is impossible to totally eliminate street vending, for it will jeopardise the livelihood of millions of poor people. Any attempt to eliminate them will only be counterproductive and lead to disharmony. Yet their operations have to be necessarily regulated so as to reduce commuter hardships, obstruction of traffic flow and hindrance to shopkeepers. In sum, at present, street vending or hawking is an integral part of urban life in Indian cities/towns. Various studies have already confirmed the fact that street vendors comprise one of the most marginalised sections of the urban poor. What was a sporadic activity found near the railway stations, bus stands, markets and other busy localities, today street vending is institutionaslised in every part of the cities and towns all over India. In fact, one can rarely find a road, street, lane or public place without the presence of hawkers. Experts say that as long as people are unable to get better jobs with higher remuneration in the formal sector, they will continue to fall back to street vending or hawking as a profession/activity to eke out their livelihood. No doubt, the presence of large number street vendors create numerous problems for the civic authorities, traffic police, vehicle users, shopkeepers, pedestrians and the general public. But it is impossible to totally eliminate street vending, for it will jeopardise the livelihood of millions of poor people. Any attempt to eliminate them will only be counterproductive and lead to disharmony. Yet their operations have to be necessarily regulated so as to reduce commuter hardships, obstruction of traffic flow and hindrance to shopkeepers

Functus Officio

 Split verdicts speak volumes

 for judicial independence: Chief Justice

 TNN | Updated: Jun 24, 2018, 05:35 Times of India 23.06.2018

Madras High Court Chief Justice said yesterday, "As far as Judges are concerned they become fungus officio after the judgment. There is no scope for a Judge to explain the judgment. Instead the judgment speaks for the judge. "

Madras High Order Setting Aside MKU VC Appointment

 But Madras High Court  failed to recognise that the lawfully constituted Vice Chancellor Search Committee of Madurai Kamaraj University became functus offico the moment it submitted a unanimously shortlisted Panel of 3 names to Governor/Chancellor. There's no scope for Committee Members  express dissent over the selection of person/persons in the panel. That being the legal position, how is it that the High Court Bench comprising of the Chief Justice and Justice M. Sundar set aside appointment of MKU VC on the untenable ground of certain wrong & mischievous statements made by Search Committee Members in their affidavits filed in the Writ Petition  against appointment of MKU VC after they became functus officio.  The judges held that the MKU VC appointee   possessed required qualifications & did not suffer from any other disqualification or deficiency.

The Court conveniently traversed towards a trivial and irrelevant terrain of alleged deficiency in the process of short listing of the panel of 3 names for the purpose of setting aside the appointment, which issue has been settled by the Supreme Court that Search Committee Members cannot revenge or go back their decisions as it would force the  selected persons to be at the mercy of the Search/Selection Committee Members.

Street Vending

Street food vending is found around the world, but has variations within both regions and cultures. Street food refers to ready-to-eat food or drink sold in a street/roadside or other public place, such as a market or fair, by a hawker/vendor, often from a portable stall. Street food is so called because it is usually sold (though not necessarily made) on the streets by people who can’t afford restaurant rents to people who can’t pay restaurant prices.  Some of the most mouthwatering dishes that India has to offer can be found underneath a small umbrella-covered food cart on a sweltering city road. But eating street food anywhere besides a dirty roadside stall, is that it's messy and unhygienic. While some street foods are regional, many are not, having spread beyond their region of origin. Most street foods are also called as both finger food and fast food, and are generally cheaper than restaurant meals. Historically, street food is purchased because many urban poor often do not cook food in their homes; some even do not have kitchens in their residences. People opt to eat street food mainly due to affordability, i.e. low prices and convenience. Still others purchase street food for other reasons, such as to obtain reasonably priced and flavourful food in a sociable setting, to experience ethnic cuisines and also for nostalgia. Moreover, the food items sold in these stalls are cheap and also hot, besides their servicing is also a lot quicker than the other bigger restaurants.

According to recent estimates   made by FAO, on an average nearly, 2.5 billion people eat street food every day throughout the world; but most of them are found in the developing countries. Data regarding the actual number of people who eat street food in India are scanty and conjectural.  According to rough estimates everyday almost 250 million people depend upon roadside eateries. During the past decade or so, roadside eateries have mushroomed in and around the cities and towns and even villages all over India, particularly in central business districts, near markets and other crowded areas, often obstructing traffic and pedestrians, besides causing hindrance to other shop keepers.                                       

Chennai city is no exception to the emerging trend of mushrooming of roadside eateries. Numerous roadside eateries have come up all over the city and the number of people street food has increased by leaps and bounds recently. And a large part of the population of the meets a substantial part of its dietary and nutritional needs through meals and beverages offered by outdoor vendors. According to rough estimates there are about 25000 to 30000 roadside eateries in Chennai. Such roadside eateries are popular in Chennai not only among the low income groups but also among the middle class. But the rapidly mushrooming of roadside eateries in Chennai is also due to due to the enormous increase in liquor consumption and floating population. Consequently, these days, almost every road/ street has numerous roadside eateries. The food sold in some of the roadside eateries Chennai is solid hearty stuff that keeps labourers going through tough days. Earlier street food included mainly idly, vada, bajji, bonda, pakoda, samosa as well as beverages such as sugarcane juice and lassi. But today it also include all sorts of no-vegetarian items such as biriyani, fried-rice, barotta, mutton/chicken/fish masala/curry, mutton/chicken/fish fry, chicken 65, chicken tandoori, etc.

Mushrooming of roadside eateries during the past decade has in fact posed many problems. Though the food is found to be tasty and affordable, most of the time the hygiene standards are not followed. Many believe that from the hygienic point of view it is not safe to take food from these eateries though on the cost factor definitely cheaper.. Official say that proliferation of small eateries over the last few years in the city has compounded the menace. Most of such eateries show little regard to hygiene and health of consumers, and specialise in cuisines that require use of high amounts of oil. It is reported that many of them utilise used-oil from big restaurants. Moreover, the unhygienic and contaminated environment exposes the food to open air, where there is every chance of the dust on the road and other insects settling down on the food. Vendors generally prepare food with their bare hands, passing on germs to what they have on offer. Generally, the water used to prepare the food and to clean the cooking and eating utensils and sometimes are other sources of contamination. The food is often stored and sold on open trays paving the way for the germs from garbage heaps on the streets to get transmitted. People manning the food stalls rarely wear gloves, have disposable plates and keep their food items covered. Most of them operate without any proper license/registration. Most of them operate without any proper license/registration. Therefore, steps should be taken to license/ register the roadside eateries and regulate their operation, but not try to eliminate them because it is not only a source of livelihood for many but also cheap food for the poor.

Sluggish growth of job opportunities in India

Sluggish growth of job opportunities in India

In India,  the proportion of unorganised sector (informal sector) workers continues to remain high. The data clearly indicates that despite more than half a century of planned economic development the proportion of formal sector in total employment has not shown any significant progress. Furthermore, even after the introduction of neoliberal economic reforms the formal sector has registered marginal or nil growth even in the highly industrialised urban centers of India. The way in which the urban informal economy has grown during the decades suggests that self-employment and very small economic units in the trade and service sub-sectors will prevail in the foreseeable future. This type of activity has much lower entry barriers in terms of level of skills or capital required than the micro-enterprise type. It is better suited to absorb the new entrants to the labour force and rural migrants. On the other hand, with greatly depressed incomes in informal trade and service activities due to the growth of this sub-sector, the increase in the number of economic units might have limits. Informal sector includes a wide range of economic activities participated by self-employed, casual workers, unpaid family workers, etc., and tiny units in manufacturing, construction, trade, transport and servicing.18 Typical informal sector participants include petty traders, platform vendors, coolies, artisans, masons, carpenters, general helpers, leather workers, handloom weavers, hair dressers, beauticians, launderers, electricians, electronic goods repairers, automobile mechanics, milkmen, shop assistants, sales girls, teachers (employed in unorganized and unaided schools, colleges) and other such educational institutions), hotel workers, cobblers, scavengers, shoeshine boys, animal/hand cart pullers, taxi/auto drivers, cycle rickshaw pullers, and the list is endless. Many of those employed in informal sector activities work only part of the day, part of the week ,or part of the year in odd jobs with low wages. Millions work as casual labour and others work long hours for a pittance. Driven by the force of circumstances they engage in all kinds of activities with low wages and no security. Many households have to eke out subsistence under very difficult conditions, being dependent mostly on the earning capacity of the household members including children. What work they can find is usually piecemeal, unstable and insecure, not to mention of backbreaking and tedious; yet they work hard day in and day out in order to earn for the sustenance of their families at the subsistence level.

The continued sluggish growth of employment in India is a cause of grave concern. Data clearly indicate that during the neoliberal economic reform period since 1991 growth of employment has been slow. Employment growth in the organised sector, public and private combined, declined during 1994-2012 compared to 1983-1994. This has primarily happened due to decline of employment in public organized sector. Employment in establishments covered by EMI grew at 1.20 per cent per annum during 1983-1994 but decelerated to –0.31 per cent per annum during 1994-2004. However, the decline in the latter period was mainly due to a decrease in employment in public sector establishments, whereas the private sector had shown slight increase in the growth in employment from 0.44 per cent to 0.58 per cent per annum during 1994-2004. Recent data show that between 2004 and 2012, jobs have increased at an awfully low rate of just 2.2 per year. But the organised sector employment growth was abysmal low. The recently released survey findings from the NSSO show that bulk of employment growth during 2004-2012 has occurred in services especially in retail trade, construction and personal services, which constitute low-paying and tough jobs generally termed as informal sector activities. The growth of organised sector employment in general has been sticky during 2004-2012 and whatever employment growth is taking place is only in the informal sector. The impact of slow pace of employment growth in the organised sector, particularly in the public sector is more severe in the case of the educated youth belonging to the socially weaker sections of the society. The minor gains arising out of the new economic policy have gone to a small segment of the society. When the process of industrialisation and modernisation is rapid enough to create adequate job opportunities with increased productivity and higher wages, the gains of development will percolate to a larger segment of the society. On the other hand, if the process is not rapid, the benefits will accrue to those whose initial economic, social and political conditions enable them to take advantage of modernisation. In India, only a small proportion of the work force is able to occupy jobs with high earnings in the modern industrial sectors and the associated tertiary sectors such as the entrepreneurial, industrial, business (executives), administrative, bureaucratic, professional, white collar workers, and managerial and supervisory cadres of the workers employed in the organized sectors. The entry in these sectors is limited due not only to their small size, but mainly because of lack of education, training, initiative, innovative skills and resources, besides the use of capital-intensive technology. Consequently, the process of development has benefited the upper-middle and the richer sections, which invariably belong to the forward communities, much more than the middle, lower middle and the poorer sections,which has affected particularly the backward classes and the Dalits.

The new HRD minister  Prakash Javadekar

 is the “right person in the right place.” He is the one who has the personality combined with diligence and pragmatism, he will be successful in extricating the HRD ministry from the controversies and deficiencies. however has to cope with numerous challenges to cleanse Indian education. the recently released national policy on education report 2016 (NPER) has convincingly argued that Indian education system is in a state of “disarray”. the most important issue is that of the degree trading deemed universities. the Tandon committee found “undesirable management architecture” in most of the deemed universities, a reference to their being family, rather than professionally, managed. the committee also indicted the 44 varsities for “thoughtless introduction” of new study programmes beyond the mandate of the original terms of grant of deemed university status. it also concluded that none of them were engaged in any meaningful research activity. when the government realised that the public mood was against indiscriminately granting deemed university status (later university status) to all sorts of private teaching shops owned by unscrupulous persons, mainly politicians. with the floodgates having been opened by Arjun Singh and reports of the poor quality and unemployability of Indian university graduates causing alarm in industry and media, the government was forced to a freeze sanctioning new deemed universities, and placed existing ones under the scanner of the Tandon committee. it is reported that at the time of the freeze order, 225 proposals for deemed universities were under the consideration of the commission, of which 37 were from Tamil Nadu, 30 from Uttar Pradesh, 24 from Maharashtra, and 17 from Karnataka. moreover, the HRD ministry constituted its own committee under the chairmanship of prof. p.n.Tandon, to investigate existing deemed universities. the Tandon committee’s recommended for derecognition 44 deemed universities was accepted by the HRD ministry. as usual the managements of these institutions approached the judiciary. the case is pending.in this context, one aspect has to be made clear. UGC action to grant deemed university status is a clear case of encroachment of state autonomy. moreover, UGC is ill-equipped to monitor and control the functioning of the deemed universities. therefore, the granting of deemed university status should be stopped forthwith. the existing deemed universities may be brought under the ambit of monitoring by central/state government.

Times of India, HRD Mantri’s real job is not fire-fighting, it’s education,  July 10, 2016,

Smart Cities

''The new NDA government under the leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had announced that the UPA government’s Scheme of RAY would be discontinued and the liabilities of this scheme are proposed to be subsumed in the proposed new scheme, i.e., 'Sardar Patel National Housing Mission. ‘In fact, the NDA Government has proposed to provide Housing for All by the year 2022 and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation is in the process of developing a new scheme to cater to housing for all by 2022, by building 30 million houses, mostly for the economically weaker sections and low income groups. The projects already proposed under RAY are planned to be subsumed in the new scheme. Experts believe that it will be tough task to fulfill the NDA government’s promise of “housing for all by 2022,” considering the track record of different government programmes in the recent years. The Standing Committee on Urban Development in its recent report (18 December, 2014) has urged upon the Ministry Urban Housing and Poverty Alleviation to make concerted efforts “to remove all the bottlenecks and implement the scheme in true spirit otherwise, the target for “Housing for All” would remain a distant dream.” The NDA government has also come out with the ambitious plan of building 100 smart new cities in the country. Smart cities are projected to be equipped with basic infrastructure and will offer a good quality of life through smart solutions. Assured water and power supply, sanitation and solid waste management, efficient urban mobility and public transport, robust IT connectivity, e-governance and citizen participation along with safety of its citizens are some of the likely attributes of these smart cities. The government seems to look forward to the building of the smart cities that will have better facilities, better connectivity and better environment. In 2015, the NDA government has unveiled a list of 98 cities, including 24 state capitals for its Smart Cities project. Moreover, there is also no reference about how far the concept of smart cities will help to make the Indian cities slum-free. In fact, it has to be noted that the strategy for the development of Indian cities, including the concept of smart cities, will not be fruitful unless it includes a plan for making the cities slum-free.

Unstable Waters: Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu is a water scarce area and rain water is the major source of water supply in the state. Tamil Nadu accounts for 4 per cent of the land area and 6 per cent of the population, but only 3 per cent of the water resources of the country. Most of Tamil Nadu is located in the rain shadow region of the Western Ghats and hence receives limited rainfall from the south-west monsoon. The total water potential of the State is 36 km3 or 24,864 M cum. There are 17 major river basins in the State with 61 reservoirs and about 41,948 tanks. Of the annual water potential of 46,540 million cubic metres (MCM), surface flows account for about half. Most of the surface water has already been tapped, primarily for irrigation which is the largest user. There are about 24 lakh hectares irrigated by surface water through major, medium and minor schemes. The utilisation of surface water for irrigation is about 90 percent. The utilisable groundwater recharge is 22,423 MCM. The current level of utilisation expressed as net ground water draft of 13,558 MCM is about 60 percent of the available recharge, while 8,875 MCM (40 percent) is the balance available for use. Over the last five years, the percentage of safe blocks has declined from 35.6 per cent to 25.2 percent while the semi-critical blocks have gone up by a similar percentage. There is shortage of water for various competing requirements such as, domestic, agricultural, commercial and industrial purposes. Moreover, over the years, proper attention has not been given to maintain the sources of water storage built in the past, viz., lakes, ponds and tanks (including the Temple tanks), which criss cross all over the State, besides the naturally formed lakes and estuaries. Over the years, a large number of the water bodies have been encroached by anti-social elements. Temple tanks all over the State are invariably occupied by encroachers. Moreover, most of the lakes, tanks and ponds have remained unattended for long and as a result, silt formation has reduced their storage capacities. Above all, unscientific (mostly illegal) sand mining has caused severe damage to most of the river systems in the State. As there is growing pressure on available water resources due to the burgeoning demand for water, concrete steps have to be initiated to desilt, renovate and restore the existing water bodies and create new sources to increase water storage facilities so as to enable adequate supply of water. For providing equitable, affordable piped water supply to the people of the State it is required to explore and tap all obtainable sources of water, including rain water, groundwater, surface sources, desalination and waste-water re-use.