Bengal govt to formulate policy, identify new hawking zones

Kolkata: Having announced that it was putting on hold for a month the eviction of hawkers illegally encroaching public spaces, the West Bengal Government is now working on a new hawker policy.

The new policy for hawkers would be framed following instructions by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at a meeting with the top bureaucrats and police officers in the state Secretariat Nabanna on Thursday afternoon.

The first part of the new policy will be identifying hawking zones and non-hawking zones and segregating them.

A portal will be opened for that purpose with detailed lists of the two zones.

As per the new policy, the state government will also rehabilitate the hawkers who were evicted during the two-day exercise on Tuesday and Wednesday.

However, sources told IANS on Friday that the rehabilitation package would be need-based.

“The administration will prepare a list of the hawkers who were evicted during the two-day exercise on Tuesday and Wednesday and identify the really needy ones among them, so that the state administration can make alternative arrangements for them,” said an official of the state government who was present at Thursday's meeting.

The alternative arrangement, according to him, will be provision of alternate places for them to market their products and if necessary, warehouse facilities for storing their wares.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee assigned Additional Chief Secretary, Information Technology and Electronic Department Rajeev Kumar, with the task of framing the new policy.

Kumar will submit a report on this count to the Chief Minister, Chief Secretary, state Municipal Affairs and Urban Development Minister and Secretary to the said department.

Opposition BJP had on Thursday described the eviction exercise as vendetta politics and alleged that the drive was conducted only in those pockets where there had been massive erosion in the ruling party’s vote bank in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections.