Andhra News: Tirumala hawkers caught in political crossfire
Tirupati. Tirupati: The licences of 151 hawkers who have set up stalls in Tirumala have been caught in the tussle between the Telugu Desam and the YSRC, putting their livelihood at risk.
The hawkers, whose licences have not been renewed since the 1990s, have continued to run their shops despite assurances from various governments that their licences would be renewed. The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) Trust Board had initiated the process of renewing these licences when Bhumana Karunakar Reddy was its chairman, as well as making necessary changes in their licences related to transfer of licences, shops and houses in Tirumala.
However, after the change of power at the state level and the TD-Jana Sena-BJP alliance coming to power, local TD leaders from Tirumala and Tirupati are now alleging that most of these 151 hawkers are YSRC cadres. They are pressurising TTD officials to cancel the licences of the existing 151 hawkers. They want the officials to allot these stalls to Telugu Desam supporters.
“We have been operating these stalls for four decades. The previous government had assured us that our licences would be renewed,” said Ramesh (name changed), a stall owner near Tarigonda Vengamamba Annaprasadam Bhavan. “However, with the new government coming to power, our future has become uncertain,” he said.
YSRC leaders say these hawkers are local residents of Tirumala and Tirupati, many of whom are legal heirs or who have purchased licences from Tirumala locals. “These are not illegal encroachers. They were operating with licences issued by the TTD. But these licences have not been renewed since the 1990s due to the negligence of the TTD panchayat and revenue branches,” clarified a YSRC spokesperson.
The TTD authorities had recently transferred shops, live hawker licences and houses to the names of legal heirs and others who had purchased the licences. However, they did not consider the cases of these 151 hawkers, leaving them in a precarious position.
These families have appealed to the TTD authorities led by Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu, Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan and Executive Officer J. Shyamala Rao to do justice.
“We demand a transparent renewal process and protection of our livelihood,” said a hawker from the Varaha Swamy guesthouse area. “Many of us are legal heirs of locals from Tirumala, some of us are YSRC supporters from Tirupati. We should not be made victims of political battles,” he remarked.
