Vadodara Civic Body Tells Non-Veg Food Vendors To Cover Them As Open Cooking Causes Eye Itching

Vadodara Municipal Corporation in Gujarat has issued a notification to restrict the public display of all non-vegetarian food being sold on the street food stalls or restaurants in the city.

According to Deputy Mayor, Nanda Joshi the decision was taken after the corporation received complaints from the people passing by shops or stalls where non-vegetarian food is displayed in open.

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What she said

"People complaint us that non-vegetarian food in open seems very unhygienic. So the corporation issued the notification to prohibit the public display of non-vegetarian food. All the food stalls and restaurants have been instructed to cover the non-veg food properly. They also need to ensure that the food is not visible to anyone passing by," she told ANI.

"Only notification has been issued at present, however, how to implement this rule will be decided after discussing it with stakeholders. Further steps will be taken," she added.

ANI

Earlier this week, the Rajkot Municipal Corporation had orally ordered officers to remove street vendors selling non-vegetarian food and egg dishes from the main roads.

Rajkot Mayor, Pradip Dav on Friday stated that over 30 carts were seized from 48 main-roads in the city so far, during the action taken as a part of the drive of removing the shops of non-veg and eggs from the main-roads, main chowks and residential areas of the city.

The Rajkot Municipal Corporation teams are removing non-veg and egg vendors on Phulchhab chowk and Shastri medan chowk since three days. The mayor said, "The drive has started considering the complaints of the people from residential areas in the city and the carts are removed from two roads every day at present."

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The mayor informed that the non-veg and egg dishes vendors can switch to industrial or outside areas far from residential areas. The vendors should make sure that they do not cause problems to residents and there are no religious places nearby for selling non-veg and egg dishes.

"Act of land grabbing"

Defending the move, Gujarat Revenue Minister Rajendra Trivedi on Friday said such kind of businesses were an act of land grabbing of temporary nature.

"This has been an issue since a long time. This is also land grabbing, even though of temporary kind I congratulate the Rajkot mayor as well as the Vadodara mayor for such decisions. Such kind of eateries not only play with the sentiments of some people, but it also causes inconveniences to the commuters as the spicy fragrance and flavours cause discomfort to the eyes.

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"This is not a caste or religion issue. Religion is immaterial. Whoever is selling such kind of dishes should buy a shop and do the business is over there," he said.

Roads and building minister Purnesh Modi also reiterated similar sentiments for the roadside eateries.

"This is a welcome decision. In the coming days, many other local bodies can take such decisions," he said.

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