Hawkers were back on the roads around the New Market area on Sunday afternoon, playing cat and mouse with police.

Every time a police team arrived, the hawkers fled and were back as soon as the cops left.

Setting up stalls on a road is prohibited under the street vending rules notified by the state government in 2018.

The town vending committee of Calcutta has also agreed not to allow any hawker to set up stall on a road. The committee has been empowered by the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014.

In New Market, the rule is routinely flouted.

Kolkata Police and the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) conducted a joint drive to remove hawkers from the roads on Tuesday.

This was not the first time such drives were conducted. Every time hawkers came back.

But this time the authorities had promised to keep a continuous vigil on the roads.

“We have a police unit present there who are keeping an eye on the place,” said an officer of Kolkata Police

On Sunday, Metro walked through the roads and found that hawkers were back on the roads.

Bags, trolleys, garments and shoes were spread out on the road for display on Bertram Street.

A few stalls selling soft toys and garments had been set up on Humayun Place.

On Lindsay Street, stalls selling scarf, jewellery and garments were set up on the road.

The hawkers either placed crates on the road and put their wares above them or spread out a plastic sheet on the road and kept the items over them.

This newspaper has reported several times about hawkers setting up stalls on roads around the New Market area — Lindsay Street, Humayun Place and Bertram Street.

Shop owners in New Market have repeatedly expressed anguish at how the roads around the market were being taken over by the hawkers. They alleged they were loosing customers who feared entering the roads with the cars as parking a car on a designated car parking zone invite wrath of the hawkers.

As Metro walked through the streets, hawkers were heard discussing when the police will come from a drive again.

A member of Calcutta’s town vending committee said that they had clearly asked all hawkers that no one will be allowed to set up stalls on the road. The street vending rules allow hawkers to set up stalls on one-third width of a pavement leaving two-thirds free for pedestrians.

“If someone is not getting space on the pavement, they should apply to committee. The committee will find them space on a pavement somewhere but they cannot set up stall on a road,” said the committee member, who is also a hawker leader.

In June last year, the police cleared Humayun Place in the New Market area of all hawkers within an hour.

The same hawkers had refused to vacate the roads and shift their stalls to the pavement when the KMC had in January 2024 asked them to vacate the road citing the Street Vending Rules.

The June 2024 drive followed chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s outburst at the police and a section of politicians whose connivance, she said, had made the city ugly.