MARGAO
A group of retail fish market vendors from the SGPDA retail market stormed into the wholesale fish market on Thursday morning to stop the illegal retail sale of fish in the market.
A day after the SGPDA withdrew the order authorising Milagres Fernandes to collect sopo fees from the fish trucks entering the market, retail fish vendors from the PDA retail market headed to the wholesale fish market to stop the retail sale of fish by unscrupulous traders.
The retail fish vendors claimed that the fish traders have all along been selling fish in retail in the wholesale fish market through loaders and porters illegally. “Our objections to the retail sale of fish in the wholesale fish market had fallen on the deaf ears of the SGPDA. On several occasions we had lodged complaints with the SGPDA, but they were not attended to by the PDA. Our business had been badly affected by the retail sale of fish in the wholesale market, but the PDA had never addressed our issues,” informed a vendor.
Apparently taking advantage of the SGPDA’s decision to withdraw the sopo collection order to Milagres, the retail fish vendors from the retail market headed to the wholesale fish market and stopped the illegal activity. Some of the vendors even overturned the boxes containing fish which were being sold in retail by the illegal migrant vendors. In fact, the PDA retail fish vendors pointed out that the wholesale fish market is only meant to sell the fish in boxes and not in kilograms.
