page_title: Street Vendors Act, 2014
section_title: Street vendors in India
hierarchical_section_title: Street Vendors Act, 2014 / Street vendors in India
caption_attribution_description: This merchant at Khan Market works around a lot of nuts! I'm sure you can relate to this... I can. I couldn't resist tripping the shutter here. I loved the blend of brown tones in this scene.
context_page_description: Street Vendors Act, 2014 is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted to regulate street vendors in public areas and protect their rights. It was introduced in the Lok Sabha on 6 September 2012 by then Union Minister of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Kumari Selja. The Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha on 6 September 2013 and by the Rajya Sabha on 19 February 2014. The bill received the assent of the President of India on 4 March 2014. The Act came into force from 1 May 2014.
context_section_description: According to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, there are 10 million street vendors in India, with Mumbai accounting for 250,000, Delhi has 450,000, Kolkata, more than 150,000, and Ahmedabad, 100,000. Most of them are immigrants or laid-off workers, work for an average 10–12 hours a day, and remain impoverished. In India, street vending makes up 14% of total (non-agricultural) urban informal employment. Though the prevalent license-permit raj in Indian bureaucracy ended for most retailing in the 1990s, it continues in this trade. Inappropriate license ceiling in most cities, like Mumbai which has a ceiling 14,000 licenses, means more vendors hawk their goods illegally, which also makes them prone to the bribery and extortion culture under local police and municipal authorities, besides harassment, heavy fines and sudden evictions. In Kolkata, the profession was a cognisable and non-bailable offense.
  Over the years the street vendors have organized themselves into trade unions and associations, and numerous NGO's have started working for them. The National Hawker Federation  (NHF), based all over India, is a federation of 1400 street vendor organizations, trade unions in 28 states.
caption: A street vendor selling namkeen snacks, near upmarket Khan Market, Delhi
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS 5D", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "237833/1000", "Image YResolution": "237833/1000", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Elements 4.0 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2008:06:28 08:29:29", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "228", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "778", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5521", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/125", "EXIF FNumber": "5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "400", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:06:12 00:31:05", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:06:12 00:31:05", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "7", "EXIF ApertureValue": "37/8", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "105", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2000", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "652", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "873600/283", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "1456000/471", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Custom", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Manual", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}