Shopkeepers who failed to pay rent evicted from Kallikudi market as per High Court order

The Department of Agricultural Marketing and Agricultural Business has taken possession of shops at the Central Market for Vegetables, Fruits and Flowers at Kallikudi for which traders had defaulted on rent.

The Department of Agricultural Marketing and Agricultural Business has taken possession of shops at the Central Market for Vegetables, Fruits and Flowers at Kallikudi for which traders had defaulted on rent.

The market, established on 9.79 acres of land on the Tiruchi-Madurai Highway in 2017 at an estimate of about ₹80 crore has 830 shops. It was constructed to shift the wholesale section of Gandhi Market to a more spacious location. Although many traders did not evince interest to shift to the new market, citing distance from the city, a section of traders came forward to take shops for rent and took part in the auction in 2020.

After the mandatory procedures and verification process, shops were allotted to traders. They were supposed to pay the rent regularly to the District Market Committee and the agreements had to be renewed periodically. They were required to pay rent with the stipulated 5% increase every 11 months. However, many traders failed to pay their rent and the electricity charges, despite repeated notices.

But, a section of traders filed a petition before the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court, challenging the notices. However, the court directed the authorities concerned recently to take possession of the shops for failing to follow rental agreements. Following this, the officials of the District Market Committee have brought 560 shops under it possession by evicting the occupants.

Collector M. Pradeep Kumar told The Hindu that the allottees were given sufficient time to pay their dues. Many of them failed to renew the agreements. They failed to take remedial action on the repeated notices. Following this, as per the Court direction, the defaulters were evicted from the shops and they had been brought under the control of the District Market Committee.

Sources said that 180 shops, which were allotted to various fruit traders about a year ago, had not attracted the punitive action as they had been paying their rent regularly. The method of formulating the reallocation process was on.