HC to set up special bench to hear street vendors' pleas

The Delhi High Court today decided to set up a special bench to hear petitions against eviction of street vendors from vending zones in the national capital.
A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal said there were large numbers of petitions pending before different courts on the issue, which was creating problems in adjudication.
It said every day fresh pleas were being filed in the high court against the authorities or the order of a single judge on the eviction issue.
"We will constitute a special bench so that all these types of matters are dealt by one bench," the court said.

The court decided to set up the special bench after it was told that some matters were pending before the single judge and it has passed orders contrary to the division bench.
Recently, a bench of the Chief Justice had granted protection to street vendors across Delhi from forcible eviction.

The order was passed on pleas filed by Congress leader Ajay Maken and others, who said the Delhi government had failed to prepare a scheme in consultation with Town Vending Committee (TVC) as per Street Vendors Act, 2014 to conduct a survey to ascertain the number and location of vendors, even when the law clearly envisages that till a survey of all existing street vendors is completed, no street vendor shall be evicted or relocated.

Maken and other petitioners had alleged that municipal bodies of central and south Delhi were "throwing out" street vendors from hawking zones, despite a court order protecting them from such action.
In their pleas, they contended that the bench on October 5 had ruled that its September 9 order that no street vendor should be evicted from the city roads without due process of law, shall not be applicable on non-hawking zones.
They had said that under the garb of this order, New Delhi Municipal Council and South Delhi Municipal Corporation were evicting vendors even from hawking zones like Rajiv Chowk, Indira Chowk and Lajpat Nagar and sought that they be restrained from taking any coercive action.