Chennai: Never in recent times Namma Marina, the world’s second longest beach, looked so welcoming and refreshing. With corporation authorities and police working in tandem, the beach has been cleaned-up and vendors streamlined. Within a month of Deccan Chronicle publishing the series, ‘Oh! Marina’ highlighting various issues ruining the beauty and pristine sands of Marina beach, the civic body managed to address most of the problems.
The biggest challenge was to regulate the scattered 1,400-odd vendors, who are often accused of polluting the beach sands dumping leftover food. The authorities, despite facing strong opposition, managed to make them toe the line. Vendors are made to operate only in the seven zones identified on the Marina which leaves the rest of the beach clean. A corporation official told Deccan Chronicle that about 70 per cent of the vendors have been streamlined so far operating from Lighthouse to labour statue. “We will adopt similar mechanism for the remaining vendors too. We are trying to do it in phases keeping in mind the concerns of vendors and tourists.”
Nisha Thota, general secretary of Shuddha, entrusted with the job of taking care of Marina, said the move has really helped. “Garbage collection has become a lot easier. We have asked the vendors to use dustbins and we are also able to monitor better. We have collected 12 tonnes of garbage on a single day with the help of 600 Chennai trekkers, a day after the corporation authorities created the vendor zones.”
Another issue highlighted by DC was chaotic parking and inadequate staff. To address this, three more staff were recruited. The major gates near labour statue, Vivekananda House and Lighthouse are now manned and parking is regulated.The response from the tourists has been overwhelming. J. Alexander Lopez, tourist and IT professional, said it was a long overdue and was important to protect the ecology of Marina, which is the cheapest recreation spot for Chennaiites. “Now, the children have a lot more space to play and, as a parent, I feel safe to allow my son to walk on the sand barefoot. Earlier, we used to find broken beer bottles and rotten food on the sand.”
Vendors call move illegal
The vendors are still protesting the move and say it is illegal. They allege that it has affected their sales. Veeramani, president, Gandhi Statue Beach Side Pavement Traders Welfare Association, which controls 300 vendors, said the move is arbitrary.
“We also have equal concern for the beach. As per the Street Vendors (protection of livelihood and regulation of street vending) Act, 2014, the vendors should be on the move always. The corporation should not allow permanent shops on the beach. The sales have drastically fallen. The Supreme Court has held hawking as a fundamental right.”
Activist and lawyer K. Saravanan said there is a writ petition pending before the Madras high court questioning state government why it had not constituted the town vending committee (TVC) as per section 22 of the Act. “When there is a petition pending in court, how can the corporation and police regulate the vendors? I will take up the matter before the court.”
