Guj: Street vendors move HC over crackdown by civic authorities

As long as a person doesnt violate any law, heshe must be free to sell anything under the right to livelihood guaranteed by Article 21 of the Constitution, it said.Some of these 20 petitioners include those selling egg items on Ahmedabads streets.The plea sought the courts direction to the respondents Ahmedabad corporation as well as Gujarat government to permit them and others to sell food times of their choice, including eggs and other non-vegetarian food items as permitted by law.

Street-food vendors here have filed a petition before the Gujarat High Court against the seizure of their handcarts by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation.

Soon after the Mayor of Rajkot on November 9 called for eviction of street vendors selling non-vegetarian food items on the ground that such food hurts religious sentiments,'' thousands of handcarts were impounded ''without any rhyme or reason throughout the state,'' the petition said.

No due process was followed during the action, it alleged.

Earlier this month, after a couple of civic bodies announced action against street vendors of non-veg food, the Gujarat government had said there would be no discrimination on these lines but hygiene must be ensured.

The petition also challenged the non-implementation of the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014, in Gujarat. Selling non-vegetarian food on the streets does not impinge upon anybody's rights, the petition said.

''A vegetarian might find consumption of non-vegetarian food offensive whereas a vegan might find consumption of milk, cheese and honey as offensive,'' it said. As long as a person doesn't violate any law, he/she must be free to sell anything under the right to livelihood guaranteed by Article 21 of the Constitution, it said.

Some of these 20 petitioners include those selling egg items on Ahmedabad's streets.

The plea sought the court's direction to the respondents (Ahmedabad corporation as well as Gujarat government) to permit them and others to sell food times of their choice, including eggs and other non-vegetarian food items as permitted by law. The plea is likely to come up for hearing soon. The petitioners also said they were among the worst-affected due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and when the situation was improving, the arbitrary action by civic authorities followed. PTI KA KRK KRK