West Bengal’s first floating market to set up in Kolkata

KOLKATA: The Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA) will be setting up the first floating market of West Bengal in the southern fringes of the city. The move is being taken in an attempt to rehabilitate vendors who were displaced during widening of EM Bypass.

A senior official of the KMDA said, “There are many sellers who have been displaced because of the widening programme of the EM Bypass taken up at Patuli area near Garia. Our principal idea is to rehabilitate those who were having their business at the Baishnabghata-Patuli market on the EM Bypass to the floating market.”

The floating market will be set up on a water body near Patuli which would incur a cost of nearly Rs nine crore. According to a KDMA official, the market will have 114 boats with stalls selling vegetables, fruits, fish, meat, cereals etc. The market would remain open for 24 hours. The decision to set up a floating market was taken three years back by the KDMA so that the EM road could be widened.

The Dal lake of Jammu & Kashmir is famous for its floating market. “We have such markets floating on the Dal Lake of Srinagar. Such markets are there in Bangkok and in.  Singapore,” he said. Of the 114 boats, the KMDA has already bought 32 and the remaining boats will arrive by this month end, the official said.