Zaveri Bazaar goldsmith units aren’t ready to shift to Panvel

Mumbai : The increasing number of goldsmith units at Zaveri Bazaar, also popularly known as ‘Bhuleshwar’, has become a cause of concern for other residents of the area.  Also, though the state government is ready to allocate space at Panvel (on the outskirts of Mumbai) to set up these goldsmith units, the owners are not ready to shift.

Swapan Das, owner of one of the manufacturing units at Zaveri Bazaar, claimed that already there business had been adversely affected due to demonitisation, and newly introduced Good and Services Tax (GST), hence, shifting so far would not be cost-efficient. “All shops are over here, therefore, taking raw gold from them and designing in nearby units is easy. Rather shifting will incur more cost.”

He further revealed that earlier he had 23 to 25 workers working in his unit, but now there were only five workers.

Mumbai Jewellers Association Vice President (VP) Kumar Jain said that it had been three years after new government was formed in Maharashtra and a meeting regarding shifting of goldsmith units of Zaveri Bazaar was held but no one had showed any interest in the alternate location of ‘Panvel’. “Since the manufacturing unit owners are not happy with the suggested place we will soon meet Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis demanding another locatio,” he added.

Raman Solanki, owner of Sangam gold chain manufacturing company, remarked that Panvel was too far and transporting gold items all the way from Panvel to Mumbai every day was risky, since deals worth crores of rupees took place at Zaveri Bazaar every day.

Residents of the area are raising an objection on the presence of the goldsmith units, claiming they were endangering their lives. On Friday late night, one of the units in the four-storeyed building – Saraswati Niwas – was gutted in a fire on ground floor. Fortunately, no one was injured.

Bharat Joshi, resident, and an eyewitness said, “At around 11 pm some blast sound we heard. Later, when we stepped down and saw in the adjoining building (Saraswati Niwas) where illegal goldsmith unit is operational it was gutted in the fire. Similar in 2001 in one of the manufacturing unit fire mishap occurred and it took 25 people lives, still, the civic corporation has not taken any action against these units.”

Jeevak Ghegadmal, Assistant Municipal Corporation (C ward) of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), however, denied any such illegal business activity was taking place. He stated, “In the apartments, clothes were stored and as per initial information, the mishap occurred  due to a short circuit.”