Vendors facing hardships due to lack of facilities

A large population in Pillewa in Boralesgamuwa that depends on selling flowers and other requisites for religious activities in Pillewa temple and several other places of religious worship in the area are facing hardship for want of basic facilities. They said it was sad that they were considered by the authorities as a group engaging in an unwanted trade. They pointed out that the basic needs of a human habitat including electricity, water and toilet facilities had been denied to them.

The flower dealers said they depended on self employment while providing a service to the devotees attending religious activities at the Pillewa temple. They said they expected the road development project to raise their standard of living and to give a new impetus to their trade but it only resulted in the loss of their livelihood.

A resident of the area running a flower stall said they were still earning a pittance to keep their head above the water due to the efforts of the Boralesgamuwa Urban Council that looked into hardships and provided minimum facilities, while the authorities who implemented the road development project only left us in a predicament.

“When the road development project commenced, the authorities promised to build permanent stalls for us. However they left us in the lurch. We are still running our business in temporary sheds. Although the road development project has been completed no steps have yet been taken to provide us facilities as promised. Flower sellers are not a part of the business community and the authorities consider ours an unimportant trade. Authorities provide facilities only to the business community that includes large scale businessmen. However, ours is a self employment enterprise that needs more attention. We do not have the capital to embark on any other business and we are compelled to depend on the meagre income from flower selling,” he said.

Flower sellers said they had been running their business under umbrellas after their stalls were demolished for the road development project on the promise of providing them permanent stalls.

They requested the authorities to provide them adequate facilities to run their trade without obstacles.