Email : office@nasvinet.org

Tel: +91-011-47553013

National Association of Street Vendors of India NASVI

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About NASVI

NASVI is an organization working for the protection of the livelihood rights of thousands of street vendors across the country. Beginning as a Network in 1998, NASVI was registered in 2003 under the Societies registration Act of 1860.

The main objective behind establishing NASVI was to bring together the street vendor organizations in India so as to collectively struggle for macro-level changes which had become imminent to support the livelihood of around 10 million vendors which stand severely threatened due to outdated laws and changing policies, practices and attitudes of the powers that be.

NASVI is a national federation of street vendor organizations. It is a coalition of Trade Unions, Community Based Organizations (CBOs), Non Government Organizations (NGOs) and professionals.

NASVI was registered in November, 2003 under the Societies Registration Act of 1860.The reasons for registering NASVI under the Society Act was mainly –

NASVI did not want to compete nor even convey the message of competing with any trade union federations.

Under the Societies Registration Act, members could participate in General Body get elected to positions and democratic norms could be promoted and also participation of the members could be ensured.

The membership of NASVI is open to Trade Unions (TUs), Community Based Organizations (CBOs), Non Government Organizations (NGOs) and professionals like Lawyers, Teachers, Doctors, Social activists who have been working for the empowerment and development of the street vendors.

In terms of recognition among street vendors, the membership of NASVI is increasing day by day. Presently, NASVI has 528645 members from 888 organizations from the states of Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Jammu and Kashmir, Bihar, Delhi, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Kerela, Manipur, Maharashtra, Odhisa, Rajasthan, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Meghalaya, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Goa, Pondicherry, and Chhattisgarh.

Objectives:

To bring together street vendor organizations of India so as to collectively struggle for macro-level changes, which had become imminent to support the livelihood of millions of street vendors

To strengthen street vendor organizations and support them in their endeavors to ensure the livelihood of street vendors. The objective is to build a strong grass-root movement of street vendors of India.

To strengthen street vendor organizations to look for long-lasting and sustainable solution to the problems faced by street vendors.

To organize International, National and State level conferences in order to bring the attention of Policy Makers, Planners and Administrators towards the street vendors.

To facilitate and support the dialogues/interfaces with all decision makers and stake holders in finding solutions for the problems of the street vendors apart from dharnas, processions, struggles.

To Collect and make available information about good practices, initiatives, policies and laws, methods of struggle, court judgments etc related to street vending and street vendors. It must be mentioned that when NASVI was formed there was limited information about street vendor organizations in India. NASVI began by gathering information about these organizations through different ways ranging from media reports, writing to other organizations and to making visits crisis crossing the country to get in touch with these organizations.

To maintain continuous communication with and between street vendor organization and also with other stakeholders.

To play role of a watchdog to protect the interest of street vendors.

Since its formation, NASVI is committed to struggle for creating a supportive environment for the street vendors to carry out their legitimate vending. All the initiatives of NASVI are focused to secure the livelihood of street vendors through policy interventions, changes in political- legal environment, dialogues with policy makers, administrators and planners, organizing state-level, national and international conferences, organizing struggles/processions/demonstrations/dharnas, supporting in crisis, providing legal aids, capacity building of street vendor organizations, financial services, collecting and disseminating information about issues concerning street vendors, sensitizing society about the issues of street vendors and so on.

With the intensified efforts of NASVI the historic legislation Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 was enacted by the Parliament of India in 2014. Now the objective of NASVI has shifted from agitation to implementation mode and NASVI is extensively working for securing the effective implantation of the central Act for street vendors thereby changing the lives of thousands of street vendors of the country.

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