Pavements under siege from vendors, pedestrians hit hard

Hyderabad: Several stretches in various areas of the city have turned into vending zones. The areas are filled with vendor carts and stalls who have occupied footpaths and roads into unauthorised market places, causing inconveniences to pedestrians, commuters, and residents.

Encroachments on footpaths have become a growing menace, with little action taken by municipal authorities to address the issue. Many pavements and the roads are being occupied by vendors and their carts, leaving people to navigate hazardous streets.

The vendors carry on their business, encroaching the pavements almost in every part of the city, including Nampally, Ameerpet, Kukatpally, Jubilee Hills, Banjara Hills, Film Nagar, Uppal, LB Nagar, Mehdipatnam, and the entire stretch in Tolichowki-Shaikpet areas. Moreover, every area in the Old City witnessed the vendors' carts and food stalls on roads and people dealing on a daily basis.

Several streets of Film Nagar, Jubilee Hills, and Banjara Hills, which were calm residential localities once, have become commercial places for the vendors. As a result, noise pollution and vehicular population have increased. Encroachments on the pavements and stretches led to traffic chaos, with pedestrians forced to walk on the roads and haphazard parking of vehicles.

Narayana, a resident of the Film Nagar housing society, said that the footpaths and roads are occupied by the tiffin centres, fruit shops, fast food centres, fish stalls, and other outlets.

These have led to a problem including traffic jams, liquor menace, dog menace, and invasion of privacy of residents as people stand on roads that have a direct view of houses. “The Film Nagar might soon become street vendor Nagar,” he added.

The society also posted the issue on social media and tagged the GHMC and police to solve the menace, but no action was initiated. However, city police posted, “You want police to do everything? There is a department called GHMC. Please request them, and police can assist,” police stated.

At Lotus Pond in Jubilee Hills, the residents said that many shops have popped up illegally in the stretch, causing inconvenience to both residents and commuters as they are blocking the entire area. “These vendors also throw the garbage and leftovers everywhere. With this, the condition of the area has turned unhygienic, drains are getting blocked, and dirty water is overflowing on roads,” said Shubham, a resident.

Another resident said, “We had approached the authorities several times to free the footpaths and the stretch. Sometimes, though the authorities evict the vendors, after a few days, they again set up their stalls. A food stall keeps the entire stretch littered with leftovers.”

Moreover, a bazaar-like stretch that sells fruits, clothes, accessories, and footwear in nearly 45-50 fixed permanent stalls along Chandrayangutta to Phisalbanda-DRDL road is actually in the area belonging to the defence academy. The defence academy, in which former president APJ Abdul Kalam began his Missile Building mission, is a high security area, but these stalls were located outside the building. Due to the negligence of GHMC and traffic police, these stalls are seen as permanent stalls, as they are very big, compared to the ones featured in the exhibition.

Interactions with some stall members revealed that they are free stalls, but both GHMC and traffic police collect money against challans. Local people complain that these stalls are causing disturbance as the customers park their vehicles on roads, resulting in traffic jams.