Mumbai: Hawkers’ union objects to BMC plan to allow food trucks in several locations

Recently, Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal held a meeting with civic officials and instructed them to draft a new Food Truck Policy for Mumbai. The civic body has so far identified 50 locations to station food trucks. AITUC Hawkers Union said the civic administration is showing promptness in drafting the policy in the direction of the ruling political party, but hawkers are awaiting their allotment of pitches.

“Despite the BMC having finalised hawking pitches and numbers of hawkers, the BMC is deliberately delaying the implementation and allotment of pitches,” said Syed Haider Imam, member of Central Town Vending Committee and general secretary of AITUC Hawkers Union.

There are 15,000 eligible hawkers in the city.

“The local authority is taking arbitrary actions inter-alia in evicting hawkers without notice, seizing and impounding their goods. The BMC and state government have failed to frame a scheme for street vendors under Section 38 of the Street Vendor Act, then how come urban local body is drafting independent policy and allow selling of cooked foods on food trucks in violation of the Act. Authorities should first implement the street vendors Act,” reads the letter.