The Weekly Sunday Market Welfare Committee (WSMWC) asked Municipal Corporation of Dehradun (MCD) to spare them the axe of the ongoing anti-encroachment drive. According to the head of the committee, every member is paying Rs 300 to MCD on a monthly basis for holding the market on Sunday. Despite this, they are being affected by the anti-encroachment operation, he said.
Talking to The Pioneer on Friday, head of the WSMWC Ashok Kumar alleged that despite the fact that they have valid permission collected from MCD for taking part in the Sunday market, the MCD officers are categorising their market as an encroachment. “We went to MCD office together to seek a solution to the problem today. But the officer we talked to failed to give us any concrete assurance on the threat we are facing,” he added.
According to the committee members, they have been given permission to set shops on Sunday. An area was granted by MCD along the stretch from lansdown Chowk to ST. Thomas School for holding the Sunday market. It is also learnt that the committee presently comprises around three hundred members. A member said that each of them gives Rs 300 per month to MCD in lieu of the permission to set shops on every Sunday. “However, we are now being looked down as encroachers. We were not even allowed to set shops last Sunday,” he rued.
Ashok Kumar, further, said, “We all are poor businessmen. Setting our shops on Sunday is the only source of income. We sell clothes to people at low rates. At the start, we were 100 vendors, now the number has swelled to over 300. MCD has already granted us permission to set the market for which we pay Rs 300 per month to the MCD fund.”
He, further, said, “Our business already incurred loss when the officials stopped us from setting market last Sunday. As per the orders from the court, we do not come under the category of encroachers. This is nothing but harassing the poor. We wonder whether we would be allowed to hold the market the coming Sunday.”
The MCD officers, however, made it clear that they would not allow the market at its present place on Sunday. “An alternative place would be fixed for them to shift to soon,” he added.