HC urges BMC to expand efforts to 20 additional congested areas to make them free of unauthorised hawkers

On September 3, a division bench of Justices Mahesh S. Sonak and Kamal R. Khata was hearing the suo motu case initiated in February last year, following complaints from two shop owners in Borivali (East) about unauthorised stalls obstructing their shops.

Senior Advocate Anil Singh, representing the BMC, submitted a progress report detailing the steps taken to clear unauthorised hawkers from 20 specific locations. The bench directed that monitoring of these areas should continue.

“What about additional areas? It is promising that you could manage these (20) areas. It can be implemented in some other congested areas as well,” the bench said and sought if there are more areas where the measures can be replicated.

“Now you have identified 20 places, by next date, let us know if there are 20 more congested areas and the same can be replicated. These pictures (about the previous 20 areas) are impressive,” it added.

The initial 20 areas included locations near Churchgate, CSMT, Dadar, Andheri, Malad, Borivali, Ghatkopar, and Kurla railway stations, as well as Colaba Causeway, Mohammed Ali Road, LBS Marg, Hill Road (Bandra West), Linking Road, and Lalbaug.

Furthermore, the court urged the BMC to address grievances from shopkeepers about encroachments by illegal hawkers, rather than requiring them to navigate between BMC and police departments.

The BMC’s lawyer informed the court that elections for the Town Vending Committee (TVC) had been held, but results are pending due to a Supreme Court order dated August 28.

The court had previously instructed the state government to finalise a scheme for street vendors under the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 by the end of September.

Given the delay in TVC election results, the state government lawyer indicated that meeting the September 30 deadline might not be feasible. The High Court has scheduled the next hearing for October 8.