THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The generous promises poured over the ever-teeming Chalai-Kothuval commercial street have been washed away in the monsoon showers. Resultantly, the merchants and customers are left to deal with tattered roads, slushy with mud and stagnant drainage spilling over with stinking filth. The monsoon rains, though sporadic, have made shopping at the street nothing short of an ordeal.The customers are forced to plod their way to shops along the pothole-filled roads. When it rains, the waste water from the adjacent fish market flows into the main street and muddy water seeps through the drainage lines already blocked with garbage. The water often rises up forcing the merchants to hunt for additional space to stock their perishable goods. The shopkeepers lament that their plight has been the same for the past twelve years. "We have always appealed to the Corporation authorities and the Ministers concerned to help us. But, except for the promises they give, we have not seen anyone really interested in the matter. The pong from these drainage lines is unbearable. You cannot expect people to come here and buy things bearing this smell and dirt,’’ says Najeeb, a shopkeeper. The street mainly has wholesale shops selling spices, vegetables and pulses. Heavy trucks have abandoned the narrow roads, now completely in tatters. Business has been dwindling for the merchants for quite some time. "Truck drivers simply refuse to drive to the street with loads. They say that it is too congested and now the condition of the road has become worse. The trucks now unload goods at convenient places and we have to spend extra money to bring the goods to our shops,’’ says Mohammed Siddique, general secretary of the Chalai-Kothuval unit of Kerala Vyapari-Vyavasai Ekopana Samithi."The Corporation is not regularly cleaning up the market. If cleaning is done on a regular basis, the waste from the fish market won’t accumulate. Now, the waste lies there and smells horrible. Finally, when it rains, it flows down to the street and then to our shops,’’ he said.Even customers who frequent the street echo the grievances. "We can’t even walk through this street. The road is hardly visible with these potholes. And with the monsoon, the market has now turned into a breeding ground for contagious diseases,’’ says a customer.Tired of the unresponsive attitude towards their repeated pleas, the merchants have now decided to bring the market to a halt. They will close down the shops and stage a fast and strike on June 29 demanding immediate steps to renovate the road and drainage system in the market before Onam. "We are really apprehensive about the future sales. If the street continues to be this way, our sales during Onam will be badly affected. We wish the authorities showed some concern for us before Onam season,’’ Siddique said.
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