Azadpur Mandi Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) in Delhi announced that they will be implementing a system of one truck per trader, starting from Wednesday. As per the rule, any trader not following the norm will have an FIR registered against them. Along with that, traders will be following a distance of 20 feet between two parked trucks and cashless payment methods. The Committee has said that they will maintain the appropriate social distancing protocols while the fruit and vegetable trading goes on.
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However, fruit and vegetable traders in the city have put in a plea to the government to refrain from filing FIRs against traders that use more than one truck in a day. And instead of alternate auction sheds for trade as per the current directives, the traders have insisted on auction sheds operational for 4 to 6 hours per day.
According to Tanvir Ahmad, Secretary, Azadpur Mandi Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee, “These are extraordinary measures we have taken looking at the current situation in the country and we expect traders to cooperate. Trading will happen in alternate sheds and traders will have to manage there supplies accordingly.”.
Traders in the city are voicing their concerns over this directive, citing various reasons for why this could be an impractical decision. As per Raju Kohli, President, Chamber of Youth Association on behalf of trade associations in Azadpur Mandi, “Some produce are highly perishable and will deteriorate in case any truck gets late or comes on days when the trading is not happening.”.
He further added that the association has suggested to the committee to consider trade timings to be between 6:30 am and 12:00 pm, a shorter duration. Moreover, since different traders have different types of trucks that are of various loading capacities, it is practically impossible and an unfair practice for each trader to follow this rule.