Street vending in Chennai

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.

Sickness of SMEs

In recent years, the small scale (SME) units have been put to cruelty and grave hardship because of the introduction of scheme of classifying accounts into non performing assets (NPA). In 1997, NPAs of micro, small, medium, large industries put together stood at 15.8 percent of bank loans. In the same year, while the SSI sector was responsible for nearly one-half of the total number of NPA accounts, its share in the absolute amount of NPA accounts was about 20 percent. Thereafter, the proportion of NPA accounts started to decline due to the introduction of very stringent norms. It declined to 10.7 percent 1999-2000 and thereafter it showed a continuous decline and stood at to 2.4 percent in 2008-09. But recently there has been an enormous increase in the number and volume of NPA accounts. The NPAs of the Indian banking sector increased to 2.40 percent in 2010-11 and increased further to . 2.94 in 20011-12. In absolute figures NPAs have almost doubled during 2009-2012, i.e. it increased from about Rs.56,300 crore in March 2008 to about Rs.117,262 crore in March 2012. And assets under reconstruction had trebled during the same period. But for the restructuring of corporate sector bad loans amounting to Rs.2.0 lakh crore in the last two years the banking sector would have witnessed an enormous surge in the volume of NPA. According to figures provided by RBI many corporates have gone for second restructuring, which shows that the situation is becoming more serious. Experts feel that applying certain common norms to classify the accounts as NPA for all categories of industries, viz. large, medium, small, and micro units, is illogical and unreasonable. To treat a micro industrial/business unit together with large scale units is sheer imprudence and ramification of neo-liberalism. The current practice of classifying industrial units as “non- performing,” if interest or installments of principal due remain unpaid for more than 90 days has caused grave hardship and untold sufferings to the small scale entrepreneurs across the country. So they have been clamoring for relaxation of norms for NPAs and extension of time limit for repayment of loans from the present 90 days to at least 180 days, following the ongoing global recession.5It has resulted in more and more SME units becoming sick and ultimately NPA in the absence of proper rehabilitation or restructuring of the SSI as in the case of the corporate sector. As a result, the SME units all over the country are in a fix, anticipating closure of their units any time either by themselves or by the banks.Reports show that sometimes the bank officers harass the borrowers even for flimsy and unorthodox reasons.