By Our Reporter
Shillong: The Shillong Municipal Board on Wednesday fenced off with barbed wire all the meat vending outlets of Polo market “without prior notice”.
According to the butchers, they were caught unaware as the SMB officials swung into action at around 5am. When they came to their respective shops they found that the whole area was fenced off.
“Such a sudden action on the part of the SMB has hit us really hard, the meat has already been slaughtered,” they said adding that the estimated loss was around Rs 20 to 30 thousand.
It may be mentioned here that the SMB recently ordered the butchers to shift to a newly-constructed house within the market area since their shops were blocking the main passage. But due to fall in income, the butchers returned to the previous location.
It is alleged that the SMB had ordered only tribal butchers to shift to the new location and non-tribal butchers were allowed to run their business from the old location.
“It’s unfair on the part of the Board to send us to a location where you don’t get any customer. The SMB should have moved all the outlets to the new location”, one butcher said.
Meanwhile, the FKJGP’s East Khasi Hills unit has taken up the matter with the SMB authorities. But the CEO was out of station.
It urged the SMB to provide a place to these butchers within 2 days to open their outlets.