MUMBAI: The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has issued an Expression of Interest (EOI) inviting representatives from resident groups, traders’ bodies, shopkeepers’ associations and non-governmental organisations to join the city’s seven zonal Town Vending Committees (TVCs), which will play a key role in deciding hawking zones across Mumbai.
Applications have been invited for six reserved seats on each of the seven zonal committees. These include two seats for residents’ welfare associations, one for traders or marketing associations, one for local shopkeepers’ associations and two for NGOs. The TVC structure comprises eight committees in total, seven zonal panels and one apex committee. Each committee has 20 members. At present, only eight elected representatives from hawkers’ associations have been inducted.
Deputy municipal commissioner (special) Vinayak Vispute said applicants must meet specific eligibility criteria. “The organisation should be a registered body, must have filed returns for the past three financial years, should not have been blacklisted and must not have been involved in any financial irregularities,” he said. Applicants must also have at least five years of experience in their respective fields.
The civic body’s licence department will scrutinise the applications after the 15-day submission window, which opened with the advertisement issued on Saturday.
Once constituted, the committees will meet to determine hawking and non-hawking zones across the city’s seven administrative divisions. The process assumes significance as the TVCs are being formed after a prolonged delay following directions from the Bombay High Court.
The move comes amid the BMC’s intensified anti-encroachment drive against hawkers since January, raising expectations among vendors awaiting clarity on designated vending spaces.
Civil society groups have also shown keen interest in the reconstitution of the committees. Nikhil Desai of NGO AGNI, who had earlier served on the TVC and is a resident of King’s Circle, said he hopes to be part of the new panel. “The TVC and hawking zones are long overdue,” he said.
The newly formed committees are expected to address the accommodation of 99,435 eligible hawkers in the city. However, it remains unclear whether they will reconsider the 20 no-hawker zones earlier presented by the BMC before the high court.
In July 2024, the BMC had identified 20 hawker-free stretches, including CSMT, Churchgate, Colaba Causeway, Dadar station (west), Hill Road and Kurla (west), citing factors such as proximity to railway stations, educational institutions and high congestion levels. The civic body has maintained that these zones will continue to remain protected from hawking activity even after the TVCs are constituted.
