Discontent brewing over move to turn Marine Drive into a street vending zone

Discontent is brewing over the Kochi Corporation’s proposed move to turn the pavement along the eastern side of Shanmugham Road, including Marine Drive, into a street vending zone.

The engineering wing of the Corporation has completed demarcation of areas, which began in April, for street vending carts on around 75% of the proposed vending zone. Already, around 50 such carts designed and developed by Cochin Smart Mission Limited (CSML) have been allocated in Fort Kochi.

“In the second phase, we will distribute around an equal number of carts in Mattancherry and shortly thereafter in Division 67, including Marine Drive,” said J. Sanilmon, chairperson, Corporation town planning committee. This flies in the face of Mayor M. Anilkumar’s categorical denial of any such plan in the area.

M.G. Aristotle, UDF parliamentary party leader in the Corporation, said that the idea was to relocate street vendors originally from Mullassery Canal Road, who were shifted to Ambedkar stadium following the launch of restoration works of the canal, to Marine Drive as the Greater Cochin Development Authority planned to go ahead with its Sports City project at the stadium. “It seems the plan has been kept in abeyance for the time being in the face of stiff opposition,” he said.

M-DASH (Marine Drive Stakeholders Association), a collective of traders and residents of Marine Drive, has embarked on a social media campaign protesting against the move to convert the area into a street vending zone. “Let the authorities come clean on the proposed move and declare that nothing would be done to hamper the prospects of traders who have been doing business in the area for decades. The proposal to turn Marine Drive into a street vending zone was taken without consultations with stakeholders. Earlier, a no-parking zone was also implemented at Marine Drive unilaterally that badly affected business,” said Rajesh Nair, one of the co-founders of M-DASH.

The Kerala Merchants Chamber of Commerce and three other traders at Marine Drive have filed a writ petition in the Kerala High Court seeking a direction to the Corporation to revisit the proposal. The traders would be affected by the decision to convert parking areas into street vending zone. It would seriously cause substantial prejudice to the petitioners as it would impact on their business, which infringes their right to carry on trade and business provided under Article 19(1) (g) of the Constitution of India, their petition said.

It pointed out that out of the 47 street vending zones marked in the Corporation’s Street Vending Plan, all other 46 points were in open areas. Carts would restrict the accessibility of fire tenders and ambulance in the event of a mishap, the petition said.