Allow banquet halls to run with 50% capacity: CCI

Jammu Tawi: Chamber of Commerce and Industry Jammu (CCIJ) has expressed serious concern over the problems being faced by the owners of banquet halls across the Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory and appealed to the Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and Chief Secretary Mehta to amend the capping restriction and allow the banquet halls to run with 50 per cent capacity. In a statement issued to media here today President CCI Jammu, Arun Gupta said that already the traders belonging to every section have suffered a lot due to the Corona lockdown and curfews besides other restrictions during the ongoing pandemic and there are lakhs of people who are directly or indirectly associated with the Banquet Hall business who are wholly and solely dependent on this hospitality service sector for their survival. He said that today when almost all the businesses have resumed in the Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory as well as across the country, one fails to understand as to why the restrictions on the banquet halls are not being eased as in case of other business enterprises when the banquet halls in Jammu are operating their business in almost 10-30 canals of land, even then the survival of these stakeholders is at stake. The CCI President asserted that it is inequitable to fix the number of persons in an indoor or outdoor gathering at 25 and equity demands that the number should be fixed as per the capacity of the banquet hall on case to case basis. Reiterating that need of the hour is to adequate steps to ensure that this deprived section of traders should be provided some relief, he made a fervent appeal to the Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and Chief Secretary Arun Mehta to fix the capping criteria in case of banquet halls as per their size and capacity and allow these to function with 50 per cent capacity.