The rain has brought back plastic sheets over hawkers’ stalls in south Kolkata’s Gariahat and New Market in the central part, months after the ugly and flammable appendages were removed for safety and aesthetics before winter.
A leader of hawkers said the plastic sheets were put on because of rain and would be taken away after the sky cleared. “The items in the stalls would have been destroyed had we not put up the plastic sheets,” the leader said.
However, Debasish Kumar, mayoral council member in charge of the parks and squares department of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC), said the plastic sheets could not be used even during rain.
A tour of Gariahat and New Market on Sunday showed many hawkers were again using plastic sheets to cover their stalls. When The Telegraph visited Gariahat around noon, some hawkers had already put up the sheets, while others were doing so.
On some stretches, the pavement was completely under the canopy of plastic sheets. Residents of the area and owners of shops along the pavements said they had been greeted with the rare sight of sunlight falling on the sidewalks after the plastic sheets were removed before winter.
The return of the sheets has triggered fears that the pavements would once again look like dark tunnels, like they did before.
Some hawkers put up transparent plastic sheets, while others used opaque ones of blue or yellow in colour.
An architect who was pleased to see a change in Gariahat’s pavements after the sheets were gone, lamented their return. “When I was passing through Gariahat on Saturday evening, I noticed that plastic sheets were back,” he said.
The KMC has barred hawkers from using plastic sheets but has allowed them to install tin shades over their stalls to protect their wares from the elements.
Hawking rules say plastic sheets cannot be used, stalls cannot encroach on roads or face roads, and at least two-thirds the width of a pavement has to be left free for pedestrians.
Images identical to Gariahat greeted visitors to New Market on Sunday. There, too, plastic sheets had been removed two or three months back. On Sunday, hawkers at the Grand Hotel arcade had hung plastic sheets at the back of their stalls. Hawkers on Humayun Place and Bertram Street, too, tied plastic sheets overhead again.
None of the stalls had plastic sheets till last week.
Mayoral council member Kumar told this newspaper on Sunday that the hawkers would not be allowed to hang plastic sheets. “Even if it rains, they cannot use plastic sheets,” he asserted.
“We will not hand vending certificates to those hawkers who use plastic sheets. We have this leverage now and we will use it. Unless they stop using plastic sheets, they will not get the certificate.”
Debraj Ghosh, a hawker leader in Gariahat, said the plastic sheets were temporary. “The hawkers will remove the sheets once the sky clears up. The sheets are back only for the few rainy days.”
Besides being ugly, the sheets are flammable. A fire that devastated portions of a building right at the Gariahat crossing, which houses the Traders Assembly store, allegedly spread to the building through plastic sheets of adjacent stalls.
“What will happen during the monsoon? It will be impossible to remove the sheets every time it stops raining and put them back up when it rains again,” said a Ballygunge resident.
