Vendors suffer at the hands of corrupt cops
Just imagine you have to stand under the sun throughout the day with no water to drink or place to sit. This is to earn your daily wages, running to Rs. 200 to 300. After this hardship, if someone takes away a large chunk of your earnings at the end of the day, how painful can that be?
One is bound to empathise with the 10 million street vendors throughout the country, who often undergo a similar fate. According to a recent survey report on street vendors by an NGO, around 40 percent of the vendors pay bribe to the corrupt government officers to sustain.
Here is what a few respondents had to say on our portal:
Every day the local police men of Cheetah Squad (Bangalore) snatch money from the vendor. Suppose the vendors earn Rs. 150, they have to pay Rs. 20 to the police. One person wrote to us, quoting a vendor, “Saabji they are the main gundas if we stop them giving money they will come and will not allow us to do business in these place.” http://www.ipaidabribe.com/bribe-central/road-side-chat-stalls-and-others-stalls
In Bangalore near the Whitefield Road at Garudacharpalya cops regularly collect bribes in the name of Hafta at midnights.
Sometimes the vendors have to charge more from their customers as they have to pay bribe to the police. As another respondent from Bangalore wrote to us, street vendors on Commercial Street have to bribe Rs. 200 every weekend.
In 1998, The National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI) was established to organize the vendors and help them to fight for their rights. However, the reality is that vendors put up with this daily corruption silently.
By Rupsa Chakraborty