Search to resume for location to rehabilitate traders
The Hindu
Relocating shops at Fashion Street necessary for Mullassery Canal restoration, says Mayor
The search for a new location to rehabilitate 74 traders who have set up their shops at Fashion Street, which has come up on slabs laid across the Mullassery Canal, will resume shortly.
The search was warranted after a proposal for temporarily relocating the shops to a holding of the Ernakulam Maharaja’s College near the college ground had to be dropped following stiff opposition from the college authorities and a section of the general public. The Irrigation Department, which has been entrusted with task of unclogging the canal, has insisted that the shops and other encroachments along the canal be removed for initiating the work. The unclogging of the canal has been proposed as part of Operation Breakthrough, the project that aims to ameliorate the city flood situation.
“We need to relocate the traders as it is necessary for initiating the work. The traders will be brought back to the area after the completion of the canal work. These traders were rehabilitated in the canal area by the Kochi Corporation some 20 years ago,” said Mayor M. Anilkumar.