For fifty-year-old Vatsala Kavale, the word ‘recession’ does not hold any meaning. While the rest of the world is experiencing a financial meltdown, this fisherwoman operating for more than the past 15 years from Dadar’s Agar bazaar fish market says that she has been witnessing an acute downslide in her business for more than two years now. And the reason is not the economic crisis, she says, it’s the thriving business of “North Indian” fish- vendors who engage in door-to-door selling. Kavale’s case is not isolated, thousands of fisher folk operating in city’s 103 odd fish markets say they are sailing in the same boat. “The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has clearly laid down in Section 410 (1) of the Municipal Act that fish and mutton cannot be sold outside the municipal fish market. We have nothing against the North Indian vendors but they don’t have proper licenses to operate. We just want the licensing system to get more regularised,” said chairman of the Maharashtra Koli Sangathan, Ramkrishna Keni. Incidentally, in most municipal fish markets women are the force behind the business. “These fisherwomen get their daily supply from the city’s three main wholesale fish markets—Crawford, Kasara and Dadar. They then sell it in the local municipal market. Considering they travel a lot, they don’t sell their catch for a cheap price, whereas the door-to-door vendors can afford to lessen their price,” said Keni.The Sangathan on Wednesday invited Mayor, Dr Subha Raul, to inspect their markets and to help them tackle what they say is ‘languishing business’. “Since the past two years we have been complaining to the civic body to regularise the licensing system but so far our pleas have only fallen on deaf ears. Their apathy towards our situation is forcing many of us to take different route but we still hope that they will take some action,” said Keni. Fisher folk allege that even peripheral business thriving in their fish markets have suffered. “Earlier, when buyers came to this market, they would not only buy fish but could do their entire shopping here thanks to the numerous grocery and general stores within the vicinity, now even their business has suffered,” says Savithri Patil from the Andheri fish market.Adding to their woes are the appalling working conditions under which they operate. “BMC keeps on promising about redeveloping municipal markets but presently we don’t even have humane working conditions. Even basic facilities like proper water supply, ice supply and toilets are missing from our markets. This has further demoralised us,” says Patil.The Mayor plans to take some concrete action. “It is high time we give some relief to these fisherwomen. While there is no problem with the market redevelopment plan, the civic body has enough man power to carry on the cleaning activities and provide them with basic amenities, it is unbelievable that these people have been carrying out their work for more than three generations in such shoddy conditions” said Dr Raul. She plans to visit all the fish markets by the end of this month, after which she will take up the matter with the municipal commissioner, “A lot of issues from the license regularisation to the condition of municipal markets have come into the fore after this visit. I will surely meet the municipal commissioner and other top bureaucrats on December 1 to discuss this issue,” said Raul. Civic officials admit that vendors operate without BMC license. “Mobile vans are not given any license from our side. This whole issue is not very easy to address. We need to take care of lot of issues with regards to health and hygiene before drafting a proposal on the same and as of now we have not come up with any concrete plans to deal with the situation,” said chief health official, Jairaj Thanekar.
