Same old footpaths

The Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) has renovated major footpaths in the capital's Gulistan area with tactile tiles for physically-challenged people, but hawkers occupied those in such a way that even a fit person would struggle to walk.

From October last year, DSCC started clearing a number of footpaths under its jurisdiction for free movement of pedestrians. The authorities also conducted drives on a number of occasions to keep the footpaths free till afternoon during weekdays.

But hawkers started to occupy the footpaths again as the monitoring stopped, said some pedestrians.  

During a recent visit to several areas including Paltan, Motijheel, New Market and Gulistan, it was found that some footpaths were completely occupied and some partially. As a result, pedestrians were forced to walk on the roads instead of footpaths, risking their lives.

The photo, taken around 10:30am on Monday, shows street vendors are selling their goods occupying a significant portion of this footpath on Bangabandhu Avenue near Zero Point. With time advancing, the footpath draws more hawkers, making it difficult for pedestrians to navigate their way through the walkway. Photo: Anisur Rahman

A pedestrian, Shamsul Haque, was seen walking in the middle of the road in Paltan area. He said he was happy when DSCC freed the footpath for them. Now the nuisance of hawkers has come back, forcing him to walk on the busy road. Not only hawkers, some agents of bus operators also sell tickets blocking the pedestrian movement, he added.   

Sexagenarian Habibur Rahman, who was also walking in the middle of the busy Paltan road, said, “What else can I do? It is difficult to walk on the footpaths occupied by hawkers while the buses are occupying the roadside to collect passengers."

Sources said hawkers are running the business on the footpaths in cahoots with influential locals connected to politics.

In a recent investigation, the Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI) has found that every day Tk 100-Tk 200 is collected from each of the hawkers on footpaths of Motijheel Ideal School and College.

 “Extortionists collect toll from the hawkers threatening them with the names of locally influential people,” reads the report.

The PBI submitted the probe report to a Metropolitan Magistrate Court, which had earlier ordered to look into the beating up of a hawker in February by local extortionists in Motijheel.

In February, DSCC filed three cases with Motijheel, Gulshan and Shahbagh police against the extortionists who collected tolls from the hawkers.

After that, the corporation took an initiative to keep footpaths of Gulistan and Paltan free from hawkers until afternoon. The DSCC also engaged some of its workers for monitoring. But the initiative utterly failed in the absence of a proper monitoring, alleged footpath users. 

Asked, DSCC Chief Estate Officer (CEO) Mohammed Kamrul Islam Chowdury said the city corporation has prepared a list of around 6,000 hawkers in different areas under its jurisdiction and allocated Tk 3 crore for their rehabilitation.

However, the work has been going on at a snail's pace; as a result, many frustrated hawkers have returned to the streets, claimed some hawkers.

“We are listed. But we have not noticed any activity of the city corporation to rehabilitate us,” said Sohrab Hossain, who sells ready-made garments on a footpath on Bangabandhu Avenue.

Hawkers are violating DSCC's order because of no visible initiative from the other side, he added.

Asked about the slack monitoring on the footpaths, Kamrul Islam said they could not continue eviction drives regularly due to a limited manpower.

About hawker rehabilitation, he said, “The proposal over the rehabilitation of hawkers has been sent to the Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment for an approval. It will then be sent to the finance ministry. Once it is passed, the rehabilitation will begin.”