Three street vendors have been booked in Latehar after allegedly obstructing a civic eviction drive near Government Middle School for Girls on October 7, while the vendors have accused officials of removing their goods without providing a seizure list.
Latehar Nagar Panchayat city manager Raj Kumar Verma filed a complaint with the police against Sophia Parween, Raju Khan and Pintu Prajapati. The complaint alleges that the three vendors had occupied government land within the civic body’s limits and were selling fruits and fruit juice from carts near the school.
According to the complaint, a civic team comprising junior engineers and revenue inspectors was carrying out an encroachment-removal operation when the vendors allegedly interfered with the officials’ work. The case concerns an allegation that the vendors obstructed public servants from performing their duties.
Latehar sub-divisional police officer Sandip Kumar Gupta said the complaint was being investigated. The police statement, as reported, does not establish the allegations against the vendors as proven.
The vendors have presented a different account of the incident. They alleged that civic officials took away crates containing sweet limes and bananas, along with a juice mixer, during the drive. They also claimed that the officials did not provide them with a seizure list, a document that records property taken during an enforcement action.
The competing accounts place the incident at the intersection of two routine but often contested municipal functions: clearing public land for civic use and regulating informal vending. In this case, the alleged encroachment was near a government girls’ school, while the vendors’ claims concern the handling and documentation of their business equipment.
Latehar deputy commissioner Sandip Kumar said the administration was aware of the incident and maintained that encroachers must vacate government land. The statement did not specify whether the administration would conduct a separate review of the vendors’ allegations regarding the seized goods or whether a seizure list had subsequently been issued.
The police investigation and the civic administration’s handling of the disputed goods are now the next formal steps in the matter. The charges against the vendors remain subject to the investigation.
