Fish Business

Jyotiben Ramobai (50) is a contented person. She has a house of her own, a strategic vending cubicle in an Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) fish market under Chamunda bridge and well-settled three sons and two daughters. Besides, she also has her own and her family’s health insured.

But this was not the scene till six months back. She would buy her stock of fish from three middlemen at very high margins and sell it from an unauthorised pavement in Chamanpura. She would face constant harassment at the hands of middlemen, municipal workers and policemen. Though she had inherited the pavement space from her mother-in-law 35 years back, this did not protect her from the oppressive government machinery.

Her fate took a turn for better when she joined Shri Matsyagandha Women’s SEWA Co-operative Limited a Cooperative aligned to SEWA. SEWA fought for nine years to get them designated places for selling their stuff with AMC having allocated 56 cubicles under the Chamunda bridge to fish vendors six months back. Jyotiben and other Cooperative members now buy from SEWA which delivers about 500 kilogram of fish from Saurashtra everyday in off season and 1,000 kilogram otherwise to their doorstep. And this is sold at lowest margins.

Jyotiben has not looked back since then. “Earlier I would buy from the middlemen. Since their profit margins were very high, I would earn only Rs 50 per day. But since SEWA intervened, I earn anything between Rs 200 and Rs 300. Besides, I also save the money I would spend on travelling to the middlemen,” she says proudly displaying Rau, Silver and other variety of fish, placed in large bowls in front of her.

Unlike the pavement space which would have been unauthorised forever, the cubicles under the flyover would belong to vendors’ provided each one of them pays Rs 500 per month for 18 months. Apart from this they would also be entitled to a health insurance after paying just Rs 50 per month. “If I or a member of my family fall ill and get hospitalised, SEWA pays up to Rs 2,000 for our hospitalisation. Only condition is that these hospitals should be empanelled with SEWA,” Jyotiben claims weighing piece of a fish for a customer.

Jyotiben has not only paid off loan for her house, she has also bought a separate flat for her son. She proudly informs that she saves Rs 1,500 per month in SEWA bank and her youngest grandson goes to an English school now. The Fish Cooperative is 300-member strong and growing.