Hawkers want alternative zone close to Charminar

Hyderabad: All attempts to shift hawkers from the Charminar area have come to naught as hawkers and civic body officials could not come to a consensus on the alternative location.

“We had agreed to shift from the vicinity of Charminar; We have proposed Charminar bus stop and the land behind the Charminar police station as the alternative sites. But officials have not agreed to our proposals,” Md. Ali, the president of the National Hawker Federation, told this newspaper.

The civic body officials, however, want hawkers to shift to the official hawker zones at I.S. Sadan and Dilsukhnagar, which haw-kers to refuse to, owing to the distance from iconic structures that draws hordes of tourists every day.

“We are still negotiating with them,” Mr V. Raghuram, the projects officer from the GHMC South Zone, said.

The delay caused by negotiations, however, appears to have cost hawkers dearly. “As we are still operating in the vicinity of Charminar in violation of the order, police, who patrol the area, seizes any item that they could lay their hands on. And later hawkers would have to collect these after paying a fine,” Mr Ali narrates their ordeal.

No hawker, he says, wants the current situation to continue. “For how many days will this go on? When alternative places were proposed by the hawkers association, why can’t the authorities allow them to shift,” he asked.

Stressing on the importance of hawkers, 65-year-old Ghulam Mustafa arg-ues that people don’t come to Charminar merely to look at the grandeur of the iconic Qutub Shahi structures. They also come for shopping affordable items.

“This market existed from the time of the Nizams. Nearly 1,500 families depend on this business. So why isn’t the government concerned about their lives?”

A local activist, Md. Akram, feels the issue will not be solved unless the police, GHMC and hawkers union agree on the alternative site. Otherwise hawkers will move court and get a stay order.