Mangalore: The Central Marker Registered Merchants’ Association had given a dead line as Jan.4, 2014 to the encroaching street vendors to evacuate the area around City Market up to 5 feet, but on Jan.3 Sunil Kumar Bajal picked up a quarrel with the merchants saying that the daily laborers carrying goods for the Merchants were not paid their wages regularly.

On Jan.4 as the dead line approached the street venders’ Association took the support of DYFI and started shouting slogans in the morning of Saturday against the merchants, not yielding to their final request to evacuate the area in the interest of their clients and buyers.

Soon there was a clash between merchants and street vendors, with a slanging match in shouts and slogans against camps of each other in front of the city market watched by desperate buyers.

The police had to step in at this junction to prevent mutual blows in addition to slogans shouted at each other by leaders of 3 Associations, merchants on one side and street vendors as well as DYFI on the other.

Among the speakers who addressed the meetings around the Central Market were Hameed Kandak for merchants Sunil Kumar Bajal for Street vendors and Imtiyaz –Razak for DYFI.

Sensing a difficult situation on hand going out of control the city police officials ordered Lathi-charge to beat back street vendors and DYFI members who had supported illegal encroachment around the market for regularization.

Kandak had stated under an act of this state street vendors should not sell their goods purchased from Central Market, up to a distance of (not 5 feet but) 200 meters away from the market. However the illegal road business he pointed out, had continued all these years without MCC implementing the law of market business, which practice went against the registered merchants who had paid in lakhs of rupees to do business at the Central Market.

Tensions still prevails as both parties are sticking to their contentions of evacuating or selling illegally around the market area all the time.

During the clash the police intervened and arrested some of the persons from both parties fighting at the city Market area in the presence of hundreds of on lookers.