Last week, it was MRC Nagar. Before that, the Mada Streets of Mylapore. In a joint exercise, the Greater Chennai Corporation and the Mylapore police have been carrying out a series of drives to remove encroachments, especially with the objective of improving spaces meant for pedestrians.
At MRC Nagar, over 50 small-time vendors who had set up permanent shops on the pavements, especially in and around Chettinad Vidyashram School, have been evicted based on a court order.
Mada Streets are new to anti-encroachment drives. There were however significant gains from the recent drive: Many shops with permanent structures that had occupied a significant portion of the footpaths were removed.
“This time, we removed many permanent structures occupying the stretch. For instance, outside the Kapaleeshwarar Temple entrance, many encroachments were removed,” says P. Saravanan, deputy commissioner, Mylapore Police (law and order). He says such drives will be carried out more often.
According to him, vendors selling flowers, coconut and other items have also been asked to leave space on the pavement for pedestrians to walk.
Mylapore MLA R. Nataraj has written to the Greater Chennai Corporation, seeking the formation of a flying squad to ensure encroachments don’t return.
“It has to be a sustained effort or it will fail,” says Nataraj.
Residents’ efforts
Meanwhile, a few residents are taking up small initiatives to prevent encroachments.
M. J. Thulasiram, a long-time resident of South Mada Street, has started an online campaign asking residents to use the pavements.
“We have to utilise the pavements more often to prevent any kind of business from thriving,” he says.
According to Thulasiram, South Mada Street was completely cleared after the encroachment drive but many of the shops returned on Janmashatmi, after getting permission from the local police.
“Many more would return before Vinayaka Chaturti,” he says.
Mylapore Residents Welfare Association (MRWA) is working with various departments to see if the vendors could be shifted to another location.
“We have proposed a place near the Venkatesa Agraharam Road, managed by the HR&C. Also, the stretch of Kalvi Varu Street, over which the MRTS line runs, has not been utilised properly. This space could be developed into a shopping arcade,” says K. Viswanathan, secretary, MRWA.
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