Jeevika: Law, Liberty & Livelihood Campaign offered a workshop to Jaipur Municipal Corporation on “Urban Street Vendor Policy and Road Map for Jaipur” on March 9, 2011. The participants of the workshop were the top officials of Jaipur Municipal Corporation who would work on implementation of policy in the city. The workshop started with a brief introduction about the Jeevika campaign and festival.

In the opening session of the workshop was addressed by the President of Centre for Civil Society, Dr. Parth J. Shah and Chief Executive Officer of Municipal Corporation Mr. Rajesh Kumar Yadav. Dr. Shah talked about growth oriented and sustainable models of development and explained why it is important to work for street vendors. He said, “There have been street vendors in all countries and all societies at some point or the other. However, later they grew up and became part of the formal economy in some countries. The growth model used in western countries is energy intensive and not very sustainable. In India, we can create a different model of economy which is less energy intensive and more sustainable by legalizing street vending.”

Mr. Rajesh Kumar Yadav, the Chief Executive Officer of Jaipur Municipal Corporation accepted the need of legalizing street vendors and executing the provisions of State Policy on street vendors. He also emphasized on education of street vendor on health and sanitation. He said, “The street vendors provide door to door goods and services to people at cheap price but we need to be train them on maintaining the space where they vend. The vendors need to keep their push cart and the surrounding clean and hygienic. They should also be educated on health issues. There is also a need of developing model push carts which is more suitable and has more facilities than the usual push carts we see today on the streets especially for street food vendors.”

The presentation on State Policy for Street Vendor 2007 ‘Phiriwalon Ka Sansar’ was given by Mr. Amit Chandra, Campaign Coordinator of Jeevika campaign. In his session he also talked about the provisions of National Policy on Urban Street Vendor 2009 and the difference between both of the policies. There was a detailed discussion on the policy provisions and how Jaipur Municipal Corporation can move forward overcoming the possible challenges of execution.

Here are few pictures of the workshop:

Here is a small video clip of the workshop: