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Every morning, before Dhaka fully wakes, its footpaths already have. Food carts, tea stalls, phone-cover stands, and fruit or vegetable baskets spill across sidewalks, parks and transit hubs in a scene repeated in cities across Bangladesh. This represents informal street hawking, the practice of selling goods or services directly to the public outside any formal business framework. It is easy to dismiss as clutter but far harder to dismiss as small. An estimated 2 to 3 million hawkers now depend on this trade nationwide, with more than 2,00,000 to 3,00,000 in Dhaka alone and thousands more spread across the country’s other major cities. Zoom out further, and the numbers get harder to ignore: Bangladesh’s informal economy, of which hawking is a visible and vital part, makes up 40 to 43 per cent of the country’s GDP and employs over 84 per cent of its entire labour force. This is not a marginal irritant on the margins of a modern economy. It is, in many ways, the economy itself.
In May 2026, the Local Government Division (LGD) introduced the country’s first comprehensive Dhaka City Hawker Rehabilitation Policy 2026, in collaboration with the Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) and Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC). The policy sought to replace repeated eviction drives with a more structured approach through QR-coded digital registration, designated vending zones, evening and holiday markets, dedicated hawker markets and inclusive management committees. While these reforms represent a positive policy shift on paper, their practical impact has remained limited. A key reason is the continued dominance of linemen or informal intermediaries who allegedly control vending spaces, collect illegal payments and operate through entrenched patronage networks. As long as these parallel power structures remain intact, formal initiatives are easily circumvented. Consequently, despite successive policy reforms, many hawkers continue to rely on informal gatekeepers rather than formal institutions, raising serious concerns about whether meaningful reform is possible without first dismantling the lineman syndicate.
This syndicate has created a parallel governance structure where access to markets depends not only on entrepreneurial capability but also on informal networks and unofficial payments. They often work on behalf of, or maintain relationships with, local influential groups, political actors, market committees or corrupt officials. Being highly influential, these linemen allocate or “protect” a pavement or roadside vending spot in exchange for daily, weekly or monthly payments from hawkers. Recent reporting and expert commentary suggest that this informal system is one of the biggest barriers to effective hawker management.
According to the Bangladesh Hawkers Federation, at least 38 “lineman leaders” operate across 65 areas of Dhaka, with over 150 linemen each backed by five to seven associates collecting tolls from hawkers citywide. An investigation found powerful political leaders and a section of police appoint the lineman leaders and linemen themselves, meaning the network is not freelance extortion but has institutional backing. In Dhaka New Market alone, more than 500 footpath hawkers pay linemen roughly Tk200 each on average, totalling at least Tk1,00,000 a day.
The true measure of a lineman’s influence lies in the apparent immunity enjoyed by the networks behind them. A striking example occurred at Karwan Bazar in December 2025, where traders, frustrated by persistent extortion demands to retain their business spaces, organised a peaceful human chain protest. Within minutes, a group of people (armed with sticks and linked to local extortion syndicates) attacked the human chain, triggering violent clashes that required intervention by both police and military personnel to restore order. In another incident, a Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) eviction operation to remove illegal roadside structures was met with organised resistance, as alleged syndicate members attacked the government convoy, vandalised official vehicles and injured several city corporation officers. These incidents illustrate how entrenched informal power structures can challenge even state authorities, raising serious concerns about the effectiveness of urban governance and hawker management reforms.
The root cause of why the lineman syndicate thrives is the economic desperation of the vendors. Most hawkers are climate refugees or unskilled labourers who migrated from rural Bangladesh to Dhaka with zero capital. They cannot afford to rent formal retail shops. The linemen exploit this survival instinct as hawkers willingly pay the extortion fees because they view the lineman as the only entity providing them a practical “guarantee” to do business and feed their families, bypassing slow state bureaucracies. However, a 5-step framework can dismantle the lineman syndicate.
First of all, city corporations have to embrace digitalisation/advanced tech as suggested by LGD. They need to introduce a fully transparent, QR-coded digital licensing and space allocation system managed directly by themselves. Every vending space should be allocated through an online platform, eliminating the discretionary power that allows linemen to “rent” public spaces. All licensing decisions, vending space allocations and enforcement actions should be publicly disclosed through a digital platform and subject to independent audit. Singapore’s digital governance of hawker centres demonstrates how transparency can reduce informal control.
The second step should be the creation of independent Hawker Governance Committees comprising city corporations, law enforcement, civil society, academia and elected hawker representatives. These committees should oversee licence allocation, investigate complaints and monitor enforcement. South Korea’s anti-corruption reforms and Rwanda’s transparent public administration illustrate how reducing discretionary authority weakens informal power networks.
Thirdly, registered hawkers should have direct access to micro-finance, entrepreneurship training, AI and digital business skills, business mentoring and social protection so that they do not pay linemen for protection. Malaysia’s SME programmes and Thailand’s community enterprise initiatives demonstrate that strengthening entrepreneurs reduces their dependence on informal intermediaries.
The next step should be the development of permanent hawker centres, regulated night markets and designated vending zones with affordable rental, digital payment facilities, sanitation and security managed by local authorities. When legitimate business spaces become accessible and well governed, the economic incentives sustaining linemen gradually disappear.
The final one should be the introduction of strong whistleblower protection mechanism and financial rewards for hawkers who provide verifiable evidence leading to successful prosecution. Georgia’s post-2004 anti-corruption reforms, which dismantled entrenched rent-seeking networks through institutional restructuring and zero-tolerance enforcement, demonstrate that breaking informal power structures requires targeting the organisers, incentives and financial flows not simply removing the visible actors.
The hard truth is that government interventions have traditionally focused on enforcement rather than institutional reform. In fact, street hawkers are not the problem, they are a reflection of deeper structural realities. As long as poverty, unemployment and limited access to decent work persist, the informal economy will continue to serve as a vital source of livelihood for millions. History has shown that people do not choose informality because they reject the law; they choose it because formal opportunities often fail to meet their basic economic needs. Therefore, sustainable urban governance should not be measured by the number of hawkers removed from the streets, but by the number of citizens empowered to build dignified, productive and secure livelihoods. The true challenge is not to eliminate the informal economy, but to transform it into a pathway for inclusive entrepreneurship, social mobility and sustainable economic development. After all, when livelihoods are protected, cities become not only more orderly, but also more just and resilient.
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Dr Ariful Islam is academic and mixed methods researcher, and Dr Tasnia Fatin is academic and business sustainability researcher
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