Kolkata: Calcutta High Court on Monday verbally directed the BC Roy Market traders’ body to shift to the temporary stalls built by Rail Vikas Nigam Limited (RVNL) within seven days to make way for the Purple Line’s Esplanade metro station.The single bench of Justice Partha Sarathi Chatterjee observed that Dr BC Roy Market Stall Holders Association’s grievances had been fulfilled by RVNL, the agency implementing the 14km Purple Line or the Joka-Esplanade corridor. The court verbally granted the stall holders a week’s time for shifting. The 528 traders of Maidan Market were supposed to shift to the makeshift stalls by Aug 26.The petitioners had prayed for six months’ time but the court turned it down, saying the stall holders of BC Roy Market, popularly known as the Maidan Market, have to shift to the “designated temporary locations and will be relocated to the original site after completion of the Esplanade metro station of the Joka-Esplanade metro corridor”.On July 30, the traders were served an ultimatum to move to the new location on the Mounted Police Paddock grounds where RVNL has built stalls for them to occupy while the Esplanade station is being built at the Maidan Market site. Construction of the station has been deferred by at least four years because the traders have been resisting the relocation, seeking “permanent ownership” from the Army, custodian of the Maidan. The Army considers the market illegal.Kishore Manglani, general secretary of the traders’ association, told TOI, “We are yet to receive the court order. However, if the court has told us to shift, we shall shift.”According to the court order, they have time till the night of Sept 2 to move to the temporary stalls at the Kolkata Mounted Police Paddock, north of Manohar Das Tarag.According to the notice, and the proposal by RVNL in the various meetings with the traders, they would be brought back to the original site when the Purple Line station was completed. The new BC Roy Market would be built atop the Esplanade station of the Purple Line.
