May 24: Development at Fatak Bazaar, the trade hub of Silchar, has come at a price — a festering dispute over which section of traders deserve to benefit first.

The district administration’s plan to replace the makeshift fish stalls with concrete shops has raised the hackles of vegetable vendors, who are now demanding similar facilities on the 15-bigha plot. They too want the comfort of selling their wares from the cosy corners of the proposed building, away from the din and bustle they are used to.

The market has been languishing in neglect for years. Set up before World War II, the exponential growth in population of the 175-year-old town has taken a toll on the market.

An overwhelming stench greets a visitor as soon as he or she steps into the market and it is difficult to ignore the shabby look all around.

Everybody — from the fish seller to the vegetable vendor and the beetle-chewing meatshop owner — seems to be jostling for space.

Nearly two lakh residents of the town buy vegetables and other food items from the market. According to an data compiled by the Silchar Retail Vegetable Traders’ Society, on any given day a wholesaler purchases about 150 tonnes of seasonal vegetables from the market. The 300-odd vendors are anything but happy at the proposed makeover of the market as it means selling their wares under the open sky till such time construction is completed.

After a devastating fire gutted the market on a May afternoon in 1980, the then chairman of the Silchar Municipal Board and now Union minister for heavy industries, Sontosh Mohan Dev, approached Dispur for funds to build a concrete stalls. However, the amount sanctioned fell much short of everybody’s expectations. Not many stalls could be constructed and only the cloth merchants benefited.

As the problems of the vegetable retailers increased, then public health and engineering minister Jagadish Choudhury arranged a meeting between former chief minister Hiteswar Saikia and vegetable vendors at Fatak Bazaar.

Under Choudhury’s supervision, a plan backed by Saikia was set rolling to turn the place into an open market for vegetable and fish sellers.

Strangely, the Silchar municipality, distributed the stalls among well-off businessmen.

The vegetable vendors erupted in protest when the district administration set up a Rs 10-lakh corpus to construct stalls for fishmongers.

Congress MLA Bithika Dev, who is also the chairperson of the 28-member municipal board, has since assured them that their demand for permanent stalls at Fatak Bazar and New Market would be fulfilled soon.