Guwahati: Increasing number of beggars becoming a problem

GUWAHATI: The state government and the local administration had earlier mentioned that they would take concrete steps to relocate and rehabilitate the destitutes of the city in order to arrange a safe stay for them and ensure that there are no beggars on the streets of the city. Towards this end, a large number of people were relocated on multiple occasions. But in the present day, the number of people begging on the streets of the city has increased drastically, raising questions about the steps taken by the administration.

Any average citizen of the city would have realised the increase in the number of people involved in begging in different parts of the city, and the traffic signals across the city have become some of the prominent locations for such activities. The traffic signals at Jayanagar, Christian Basti, Chandmari, and Six Mile are some of the spots where you can find such people almost every day. Other places, including places of worship and popular shopping spots, also see the presence of beggars, with their number increasing every day.

Most of the people involved in such activities seem to be old or have some form of physical deformity, but some very young children are also seen getting involved in the same way of life. Apart from becoming an eyesore for the people visiting the city, these incidents of begging also raise several safety risks, as these people often walk between vehicles paused at the signals and find themselves in the middle of drivers trying to make their way out when the signal opens. It has also been noticed that several miscreants and thieves also roam around as beggars. On several occasions, it was noticed that children or youth who act as beggars grab phones or wallets through the open windows of vehicles and flee from the spot.

A lady who drives from her home near Jayanagar to her office in Ulubari mentioned this problem. She said, “These incidents make us so uncomfortable when we stop at a traffic signal. These people are not locals and hardly speak Assamese, if any. The administration should take note and take appropriate action to avoid any possible untoward incident out of negligence or anger.”

On one side, the public expressed their unhappiness regarding the increase in the number of beggars. Some of the people involved in begging mentioned that they were in fact taken to shelter homes, but they came out of there as they did not like the conditions in these facilities and mentioned that they were more content living in the streets. So it remains to see if the administration can take any action regarding these incidents and ensure that they get the necessary facilities in these facilities. Another key point is that most of the people involved in such actions are non-locals and non-Assamese, so the administration needs to find out from where these people have arrived in the city and take steps to mitigate the problem at the source.

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