The Moving Markets of Mumbai



By Ipshita Bhattarcharyya and Nicole D'Souza

 Movement and Mumbai are no strangers to one another. Since its inception as a trade city, to becoming a residential, commercial and entertainment hub, Mumbai has grown both spatially and culturally, accommodating a flow of people, culture, languages and realities. As the financial capital of India, it has also expanded economically. Mumbai’s economic growth is largely associated with the growth of the formal economy, and an increasing number of formalised systems of business and commerce. 

Yet, all across the city, there are markets that go unseen from the shutter windows of cars running on the same streets as local vendors do. Whether it’s the dainty ‘jhumkas’ in local trains or a line of vendors selling ripped jeans on the streets of Bandra, all of them are pushed under an umbrella of being called the unorganised informal sector. According to the Ministry of Labour and Employment, the unorganised sector involves activities of small and family enterprises, and is characterised by non-unionised and scattered labour-intensive work. Employment is irregular and earnings are meagre (Unorganised sector, n.d.). 

Paradoxically, the ‘unorganised’ sector is not as unorganised as the name suggests. There are systems and decided patterns of functioning and interaction. It’s fascinating how smaller economies in this sector not only thrive daily but have also sustained over decades in a city like Mumbai, that many quite literally deem to be “not for beginners”, with very little government support or aid. 

The informal unorganised sector contributes approximately 60% to the national income of the country (Unorganised sector, n.d.). It comprises daily wage labourers, hawkers, street vendors, garment workers, fisherpeople, farmers. Many of them are self-employed. In fact, in 2017-18, 86.8% of the Indian workforce belonged to this sector (Murthy, n.d.). Apart from direct earnings, the unorganised sector also contributes to Mumbai’s growing economy indirectly, by assisting the formal sector’s functioning and providing employment to thousands across the city. This number becomes larger when one takes into consideration the fact that several industries are sustained by it. Small manufacturers of commodities like household goods such as homemade sweets and snacks, cosmetics and other beauty products, and jewellery, often cannot afford to retail their products through distribution channels of the formal sector (Chinnappan, 2016). Thus, their small scale businesses turn to local vendors for distribution. Vendors and hawkers thus sustain not only themselves, but also a community of local manufacturers and industries.

Within the unorganised sector itself, there are many markets that do not have permanent set-ups, and shift often, due to the nature of their work, the lack of resources, and external agents that force them to. Think of the hawkers in local trains, chaat sellers, vegetable markets on pavements, the persons who deliver newspaper and milk every morning to households. These economies are subsistent in nature, with profit margins being low. Due to their relatively ‘poor’ nature, capital investment into informal businesses is limited, and thus, they often have to make do with minimal and impermanent infrastructural resources, rendering many of them ‘roofless’. This often disallows them protection from environmental risks and hazards, having increasingly concerning implications in the context of climate change. 

Although, to some, it may seem that mobility becomes a characteristic advantage of shifting markets, the truth is that they are often at the mercy of the weather conditions in particular, and the city in general. Weeks of heavy downpour or unbearable heat is seen as part and parcel of the “Mumbai experience”. But, upon peeling back every one layer of the romanticisation of this very experience, comes the harsh reality that temporarily stationed vendors face. Multiple vegetable vendors, flower markets, hawkers, etc. bear the brunt of rains, cloudbursts, cyclones, floods, fatigue during extremely humid days and would not romanticise their experience. Having a roof over one’s head proves a needed separation from one’s environment, and the lack of which often brings people close to literal and figurative devastation from not just unfriendly climatic conditions, but of their means of livelihood.  

Many, however, find ways to adapt to their circumstances. Salès (2017) mentions that even when the vast bulk of hawkers work in settings with high levels of pollution, noise, and sun exposure, some in better locations use street furniture to set up more permanent pitches. Through bribes or affiliations, they might be able to bargain for a parasol, access to electricity, or a seat, and in turn, could also succeed by claiming and establishing their legitimacy through these physical features. The most vulnerable street vendors have no designated space, sell straight from the ground, occasionally even on the road, sometimes even facing exclusion. “Rooflessness” is a harsh reality to shoulder when we look at any space that people associate themselves with. However, when it comes to being a street vendor, being “roofless” works as per individual needs. 

Besides, the degree with which local markets “shift” differs significantly. For example, when it comes to being a vendor on the streets of linking road in Bandra or whether it is about selling ‘puran poli’ in a packet from train to train, it works to their advantage to not have a permanent roof, so as to move from person to person and expand their earnings. However, when it comes to vegetable vendors that are temporarily stationed, a roof, whether it is an umbrella or a large common plastic spread out like a blanket that covers all vendors equally, becomes essential to function smoothly. 

Moreover, the permanence and legitimization of spaces of belonging are argued over with “tactics,” differing from one another. Long-time hawkers deem themselves to be the "owners" or maliks of their pitches, which they are free to "remortgage" to other vendors. Even without a licence, the age of the stall can inadvertently indicate how long it has been in the city. This ensures a certain level of legitimacy, says Salès (2017). 

As a matter of fact, the informal economy works like a shadow economy, says Scheinder and Williams (2013), creating commodities that are legal but lacking legal backing or protection. Space is recognised as an important asset to possess to enable a smoother process when it comes to negotiation with respect to renting to set up local markets. These negotiations are persuaded and backed with the social status of the vendors when considering candidates for renting. Bandyopadhyay (2009) takes on a Marxist lens, stating that street vendors are too divided a group for class consciousness to develop, existing as a bridge between Lumpenproletariat and the enterprising lower middle class, but never organised enough to collectively advocate for themselves through labourers organisation and protests.

Their working conditions are further debilitated by the fact that there is a general perception of hawkers on streets and in trains as encroachers of public space, disrupting movement. In the late 1980s, as factories began to close down, many who had lost their jobs turned to the informal sector for sustenance (D’Monte, 2002). An increase in street vendors prompted court judgments that instructed the creation of ‘hawking’ and ‘non-hawking’ spaces in the city. These non-hawking spaces included a 150 metre distance from places such as railway stations, colleges and schools, hospitals, residential areas (Anjaria, 2006). Ironically, these are the spaces where commodities provided by hawkers would be most in-demand, and thus, the formulation of a system had harmful implications for business. No hawkers would be allowed on the street after 10 pm, and only one licence could be issued per family (Anjaria, 2006). 

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation [BMC] never actually implemented the hawking zones. Instead, they set up what was known as the ‘pauti’ system (Anjaria, 2006). Vendors were charged a minimal fee for illegally occupying streets and were allowed to continue their business, while it also ensured the municipal corporation had a constant source of revenue. However, in 1998, a petition filed by the Citizens’ Forum for the Protection of Public Spaces [CFPPS] in the Bombay High Court, the lack of authorisation behind BMC’s pauti system was brought to light (Anjaria, 2006). 

The end of the pauti system, however, worsened conditions for hawkers. Bribery demands from state officials increased, both in frequency and in amount. Even today, hawkers are forced to pay ‘hafta’ or bribes to government representatives. They are subjected to frequent raids and harassment. These issues have adverse impacts on their health and well-being, increasing costs of healthcare as well (Chinnappan 2016).

Parallels can be found in the Railways as well, with officials sharing the belief that hawkers are a menace. Hawkers in trains are also forced to pay haftas, which is why they limit their markets to a specific radius. For instance, many vendors sell their goods only between Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus [CSMT] and Byculla, and pay the railway police at CSMT. If they go beyond this area, they would have to pay hafta to police at every station (Chinnappan, 2016).

Hawkers often build close long-term relationships with their customers characterised by loyalty and trust. They hold a sense of responsibility towards their customers, who are often women, and working class persons. Yet, negative sentiment is echoed by many private citizens in the city as well. There are several residential areas and retail outlets that resist the presence of street vendors. A common tactic used by them is to plant shrubbery in the places where hawkers sit immediately after BMC demolishments, so they cannot set shop again. Many employ security guards. Similarly, commuters who use the local train complain of having “to make their journey in the company of beggars, eunuchs, middle aged men and scrawny urchins” (Chinnappan, 2016, p. 5). Yet, their commodities are sold and their small economies thrive on demand from these very same commuters.

This begs the question: who are the public spaces meant for? In her work, titled ‘Downtown is for People’, Jacobs (1958) states that “downtown has had the capability of providing something for everybody only because it has been created by everybody” (The citizen, para. 1). Thus, streets are built around the needs and preferences of the people that use them every day. It is exactly why busy roads with vendors selling commodities of everyday use always get more attention than ‘cleaner’, aesthetically designed, wider streets.

State planning often involves undertaking a “God’s eye-view, or the view of an absolute ruler” (Scott, 1998, p.249). In stark opposition, local markets composed of street vendors, prioritise local knowledge. They allow for vibrant and dynamic street lives, and locations for people to gather and socialise. Hawkers’ presence on the streets and in trains also make spaces safe, at odd hours of the day. Anjaria (2006) provides several accounts from both Mumbai residents and vendors about instances of street hawkers preventing store robberies and sexual harassment against women at night. Many jewellery stores encourage street hawkers to sit in front of their shops, and have had long and warm relationships with them. 

Thus, hawkers find themselves in an odd position. Their presence is desired to a limited degree in the sense that it provides officials with illegal revenue and to people of the city with commodities they require at affordable prices. Yet, they remain the ‘Other’, undesired and inconvenient in the public spaces they occupy and make their own. As Chinnappan (2016) mentions, their presence is resisted, their temporary shops demolished, and they are subjected to harassment. However, their presence is acknowledged when counting them up for surveys, and when they have to be represented in law, policy, unions and quotas. 

These are some of the country’s most vulnerable and, in every way, unrepresented people thrown to their own resources in devising what they do for a living. In a city that is burgeoning with economic, political, social and environmental change, many new realities have been forced upon street vendors, train hawkers, and other impermanent markets. Yet, not only do such markets find ways to stay abreast of these shifts that they cannot control, they have also displayed great adaptiveness and resilience, perhaps staying true to the very core principle of Mumbai: change is inevitable, and one must keep moving with it.

References

Anjaria, J. S. (2006). Guardians of the bourgeois city: Citizenship, public space, and middle–class activism in Mumbai. City and Community, 8(4), 391–406. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6040.2009.01299.x

Bandyopadhyay, R. (2009). Archiving from below: The case of the mobilised hawkers in Calcutta. Sociological Research Online, 14(5), 27–37. https://doi.org/10.5153/sro.2008

Chinnappan, D. (2016). Formalising the quandary of the informal sector: A study of the female hawkers in the local trains of Mumbai. The Rights. http://eprints.qut.edu.au/105117/

D’Monte, D. (2002). Ripping the fabric: the decline of Mumbai and its mills. https://ci.nii.ac.jp/ncid/BA80390646

Fukuyama, F., & Scott, J. C. (1998). Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. Foreign Affairs, 77(4), 121. https://doi.org/10.2307/20048980

Jacobs, J. (1958). Downtown is for people. Fortune Magazine. https://fortune.com/article/downtown-is-for-people-fortune-classic-1958/

Murthy, S. V. R. (n.d.). Measuring informal economy in India: Indian experience. In International Monetary Fund. Retrieved September 10, 2024, from https://www.imf.org/-/media/Files/Conferences/2019/7th-statistics-forum/session-ii-murthy.ashx#:~:text=In%20terms%20of%20employment%20share,indicating%20the%20level%20of%20outsourcing.

Salès, L. (2017). The Street Vendors Act and the right to public space in Mumbai. Articulo – Revue De Sciences Humaines, 17–18. https://doi.org/10.4000/articulo.3631

Schneider, F., & Williams, C. (2013). The shadow economy. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3915632

Unorganised sector. (n.d.). Dattopant Thengadi National Board for Workers’ Education and Development. https://dtnbwed.cbwe.gov.in/DynamicWebPages/DynemicPages?MenuId=86




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