This fish market off Marina Loop Road cost Rs.14 crores for the Chennai Corporation. Smart and well-designed.
But on Sunday evening, we found at least 40 fish hawkers selling from make-shift stalls arranged outside the designated hawking spaces and closer to the parking lot.
They had a reason to abandon the comfortable setting.
As one explained, “There are few hawkers at work in the evenings and to attract shoppers, we have to sit together and closer to the gates.”
The reason held water. But this make-shift hawking will disappoint GCC commissioner J. Kumaragurubaran who has gone that extra mile to manage the launch of this market and intends to better the facility.
It is said over 300 hawkers who hawked on the sands off Marina Loop Road, got OK cards to hawk inside this market. They have to pay a rental. But only 75% of them hawk on all days; and hardly 25% hawk here in the evenings.
“We don’t want to sit far away from each other in the evenings when the hawkers are less. That’s why we moved together to the car park side,” explained a hawker.
GCC has noted some more suggestions from hawkers that are key to smooth operations here. 1. Better roof cover to shut off the harsh sunshine on stalls. 2. Redoing the hawking platforms which are flat now and do not allow good display of fish 3. Better storage of hawkers’ small storage boxes.
GCC will soon have a private services management company handle the cleaning and maintenance of the market, process fish waste and manage storage. The civic body does that now.
It is going to take time for this market to turn out to be a good, smart one.
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