(TibetanReview.net, Oct15’22) – Jaipur, the largest city and capital of India’s Rajasthan state, has provided a permanent market and also expressed readiness to provide self-financed housing to the Tibetan people holding a seasonal winter garments market to enable them to continue their business throughout the year, reported the firstindia.co.in Oct 15.
Tibetans doing such seasonal business for their livelihood in towns and cities across India usually set up temporary, market-shift markets for this purpose and have been facing rising difficulties in recent years due to lack of space.
The report cited Commissioner of Rajasthan Housing Board (RHS), Pawan Arora, as saying Oct 14 that for ease of business to Tibetan refugee businessmen who come to Jaipur for woollen clothing business in winter season and to enable them to do their business throughout the year, the housing board was ready to provide them its surplus flats located in Pratap Nagar on 13-year instalments.
“If Tibetan refugee businessmen propose, RHB may also consider bringing a separate business plan for them in Pratap Nagar,” Arora has said while addressing the inauguration of winter season sale at Shri Jhulelal Tibetan Market located at Shipra Path of Mansarovar on Oct 14.
He has said the biggest problem facing the Tibetan refugee businesspeople was the lack of a permanent place to live in the city.
“The Board can solve their housing problem by providing surplus flats in instalments. With this, they will be able to do their business here permanently. It is a happy moment that Tibetan refugees have once again come to Jaipur with double zeal for the woollen and warm clothing business,” Arora has said, extending his best wishes to the Tibetans, who were members of the Tibetan Refugee Hosiery Readymade Seller Union, for the upcoming winter season.
He has also visited the shops set up by Tibetan businessmen at Shri Jhulelal Tibetan Market.
The Housing Commissioner has said the market being run by the Tibetans had been lying unused for a long time. “No one came to buy these shops for 13 years after they were built. Those to whom the Board allotted shops here, they also got their allotments cancelled. In such a situation, the RHB not only removed the shortcomings of this market, but also provided a permanent shop for business to Tibetan refugees by disposing of these shops,” Arora has said.
Tibetans have expressed gratitude to the board’s gesture.
“The Board has fulfilled our long-standing demand of providing a permanent market by allotting 266 shops of this market to the Tibetan Refugee Hosiery Readymade Seller Union last year. For this the Union is grateful to RHB Commissioner,” Ms Lhamo, the president of the Tibetan union has said.