If you thought Delhi had seen the last of bandhs and protests, get ready for some bad news as traders in the capital have once again embarked on a week-long protest against the sealings, starting today.

The coming week, christened the "Sealing Chetna Saptah", would see massive protest marches, demonstrations, hunger strikes and torch rallies in several parts of the city. Several meetings would also be held all through the week in different markets of the city where political leaders would also be invited to express their solidarity with traders.

The focus of the protests, this time around, would be the order of the Supreme Court-constituted Monitoring Committee striking down relief for commercial establishments operating from DDA and Group Housing Society flats. In case of these establishments, no relief had been granted even to small neighborhood shops or even if the establishments were located on a notified commercial stretch. In fact the MCD had already started sealing these establishments. The objective of this week-long protest across the capital was to draw the attention of the centre and the Delhi government towards the plight of these traders.

The traders' body has also demanded that the Urban Development Minister S Jaipal Reddy intervene and stop the sealing drive in accordance with the assurance that he had given on the floor of the parliament. Traders also had plans of meeting the Minister of State for Urban Development Ajay Maken to put across their immediate concerns in front of the government.

The Supreme Court mandated sealing drive resumed last month and since then the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) had already sealed over 2,000 commercial establishments in residential areas so far. In November, the apex court had dismissed three petitions by the central government and the MCD with an appeal to stop the sealing drive. However, it extended relief to nearly 20,000 traders who had filed affidavits assuring that they would not misuse their premises for commercial activities till January 31, 2007. Around 1,700 schools were also exempted from the ambit of sealing till the next academic session in April 2007.

Despite this the traders don’t seem to be in a mood to relent and are likely to keep up the pressure on the government to find a remedy for their woes.