Charm of Vishwanath Gali to return at KV Dham market

Varanasi: The glamour of Vishwanath Gali, which had been an attraction, especially for women seeking cosmetics and ornamentation articles for decades in the city, will soon return.
However, it is yet uncertain that the shops being opened in the market lane of Kashi Vishwanath Dham will offer the same articles as were available in old Vishwanath Gali or only the souvenir items for pilgrims and tourists.
Shri Kashi Vishwanath Special Area Development Board chief executive officer Sunil Verma told TOI that, “We have completed the process of allotment of all 76 shops on the KV Dham campus and the process of registration of 15 shops has been completed while eight of them have also started operating. Process of finalization of lease agreement and registry of other shops are being completed at an accelerated pace and all the shops are likely to be operationalized in the coming two-three months.”
With the beginning of removal of over 390 buildings to develop Kashi Vishwanath Dham in 2018-19, the glittering shops of Vishwanath Gali had also lost its existence. Though shops of utensils and toys were also in a large numbers before the shops in Vishwanath Gali were razed, this market with shops of bangles, cosmetics and artificial jewelleries remained abuzz, especially with women buyers from across the country. Most of these shops were running on rent.
With the launch of the Rs 900 crore KV Dham project, the officials said, the affected traders especially those, who were running their outlets on rent, were assured to be given priority in the allotment of shops in KV Dham. Following the opening of KV Dham and completion of civil works at 23 major buildings the board in 2022 started the process of allotment of shops inside KV Dham through auctioning.
“We had started the allotment of shops in September 2022 by giving priority to those traders, who were running their outlets in the rental shops of the buildings, which were removed after purchasing for KV Dham project”, said Verma adding, in 41 small shops of 12 square meter area each 76 shop, including those 75, who have been rehabilitated against the removal of their old shops, had been given outlets through allotment process. The rehabilitated traders had also been given compensation in past and rebate in the registration process, he added.
Allotment of the shops has been done by ensuring an opportunity to earn livelihood to one person from one family, said Verma.
“We also held talks with the traders interested in operating shops in KV Dham and helped them in getting a loan from the bank. After the interested traders gave their consent, the allotment was started in September 2022 through lottery process”, said Verma adding with the completion of their paper works eight out of 15 traders have started their outlets in the allotted shop, he said.
Most of these shops are constructed between KV temple and Saraswati Phatak inside KV Dham