Pune: Underprivileged people of Pimpri-Chinchwad who run their daily life on collecting scrap from shops and sell to scrap dealers had no income on Wednesday due to the Maharashtra Bandh being observed.
Mahesh Chandanshive, who collects scrap from shops, said, “We collect scrap including papers, cartons, cardboard from general stores, cloth shops, steel shops, medical shops and others in Akurdi and Dange Chowk. From these shops, more than 1,000 kg scrap is collected. We sell it to scrap dealers and earn Rs 2,000 to 3,000.”
He added, “For two days as there were bike rallies by some groups who threatened the shopkeepers to shut their shops, we were not able to collect scrap, which is why we cannot generate our daily income. Even on Thursday, the collection of scrap from the shops was only 300 kg and from that we earned only Rs 500.”
Another scrap collector, Kiran Dhige, said the violence had affected mostly the underprivileged people who are dependent on daily wages. Milind Ghore, another scrap collector, said, “If this strike would have continued for more days, we could have gone bankrupt as there was no other way to earn money.”
