Police aim to implement the same model across markets in the city Telegraph picture

Police have started to enforce the rules of social distancing in markets that have been attracting the largest crowds during the lockdown by shifting out temporary shops from these markets on roads.

So far, the police had asked customers to maintain social distance in markets. Circles had been drawn at least a metre apart to ensure people waited for their turn instead of crowding at shops in markets.

From Tuesday, several temporary shops have been shifted out of big markets on to the roads, which have been otherwise empty because of the lockdown.

Every stall outside the market area is roughly about six feet in length and there is a gap of at least two feet between two stalls.

“The permanent structures inside a market where fish and meat are sold have been kept intact. Only the temporary shops that mostly sell grocery items have been shifted out,” an officer in Lalbazar said.

The markets in Gariahat, Bagmari, and Behela are some from which temporary shops have been shifted out, thereby expanding the market area.

Gariahat market has more than 250 shops, one-third of which has now been shifted out of the market to ensure crowd management. Temporary shops have been shifted out on the link road adjoining the market.

Roadside hawkers in the Muchibazar area who sit on either side of Ultadanga Main road have been shifted to the Aurobindo Sangha ground not far from the original location.

Similarly, hawkers and temporary shops that used to operate from outside the entrance to Bagmari market will be shifted to Bagmari Park in Maniktala, the police said.

An officer said the idea was to ensure not just customers but also shopkeepers maintained social distance. “If safe distance is maintained between two shops, the chance of overcrowding automatically gets minimised.”

Efforts are on to implement the same model across all the markets in the Calcutta Municipal Corporation area, the police said.

Cops, though, have found it difficult to implement the model in wholesale markets in central Calcutta. “It is practically not possible to maintain social distance between labourers who load and unload goods on and from trucks,” an officer posted in the central division said. “At times, gunny sacks weigh close to 100kg and it takes two or more labourers to carry such sacks. We are helpless in such times.”

The wholesale markets of Burrabazar, Jorasanko and Posta remain “very crowded all through the year”. Shopkeepers there, too, are trying to follow social distancing rules.