For the past two decades, Bangladeshi street vendors in Jackson Heights, Queens, have looked to Ramadan as prime time for selling and connecting with the local Muslim community.
But the busy strip where about a dozen of them usually sell Islamic items on 37th Avenue, between 73rd and 74th streets, was unusually void of crates and tables full of religious texts, prayer mats and hijabs on Thursday after police officers ordered them to leave on March 8 — just two days before the beginning of the holy month.
“Police did not come since about two years ago,” said 55-year-old Mohammad Ashraful Biswas, who worked at Popeyes before taking over the business in 2008 from his father — who’d became one of the first street vendors selling Islamic goods in Jackson Heights two decades ago after realizing there weren’t stores retailing them.
Biswas continued, referring to the moment when police officers rounded up vendors on the block last Friday night and issued him a $250 ticket for unlicensed street vending: “He told us, ‘If you sell again, we’ll pick up all your business stuff.’”
The roughly dozen vendors who usually sell Islamic goods on the block gathered near “Bangladesh Street” Thursday after an early afternoon prayer in a nearby mosque, and said they have been afraid to return. Many have since lost their incomes entirely, and are struggling to pay for rent and groceries.
“My biggest fear is that I’ll get arrested for working without a license,” MD Nasir Uddin, who supports his family of five including his three younger siblings, told THE CITY in Bengali through an interpreter from the nonprofit Street Vendor Project. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to help my family or provide for them anymore — that’s my biggest fear.”
Uddin, 40, said he has been unable to enter the waitlist for a merchandise vendor license because applications for them are often closed, with more than 11,920 already stuck on an immovable queue. He called for the city to increase license issuance for product merchants like himself, which has for decades been capped at 853 citywide for non-veteran sellers.
A bill by Councilmember Pierina Ana Sanchez (D-The Bronx), reintroduced to the City Council in February, would require the city Department of Consumer and Worker Protection to provide 1,500 merchandise vendor licenses annually for the next five years, with the cap lifted entirely after that.
Uddin said he began vending after losing his job at a grocery store in 2020, at the height of the pandemic. He began looking for jobs in Jackson Heights, he said, and soon found street vending through other Islamic goods sellers.
“When I look at this space, it looks empty right now,” said Uddin, who added that business usually boomed during Ramadan, the holy month of introspection, repentance and renewal for Muslims. “It’s a tough time for us. We had been looking forward to the customers.”
MD Ali, 63, chimed in in Bengali, saying he has missed bargaining with fellow Bangladeshis and Indians and Pakistanis in the neighborhood. During Ramadan, he said, he usually gives in at some point in the expected, endless haggling as a gesture of good faith.
“Customers keep asking us why we’re not open — and keep asking us to open regardless of the ticketing situation,” he said.
The NYPD, which is supposed to play a secondary role to the Department of Sanitation in vendor enforcement, did not respond to a specific question about what prompted the police sweep in Jackson Heights. A department spokesperson, who did not give their name, said that “police officers use discretion and sensitivity when addressing vendor conditions, issuing warnings as a first response, where appropriate and consistent with public safety.”
‘It’s So Nostalgic’
On Thursday, 45-year-old Abdul Zabber displayed crates of hijabs, tupi caps, prayer mats, Halal perfumes and Islamic texts as the sole Islamic goods vendor remaining on the block. He’s only able to continue selling, he said, because he runs a basement store on the strip, which in turn allows him to display goods within three feet of the building.
But before last Friday, he’d been used to showcasing a much wider array of merchandise from the other side of the curb, he said, where tables can stretch out between tree beds.
“I want to be able to go back there to sell,” Zabber said in Bengali. “When the police came, I was thinking, ‘If this is my only business here, is it over? Is street vending on 37th Avenue over?’”
Zabber’s father had started the family street vending business 15 years ago when he immigrated from Bangladesh, he said, earning enough money to eventually expand into a brick-and-mortar store on the block. He took over three years ago, the younger Zabber said, to continue the family’s legacy.
Taneea Akthar and Salma Rahhali were among the few Jackson Heights residents who stopped by Zabber’s setup to purchase prayer mats that afternoon. Rahhali, 19, said she was drawn to Zabber’s mats because they’re thick and comfortable and came with an irresistible price tag compared to retail stores.
“I always pass by them, and I was like, ‘Yea, I’ll buy them today’,” Rahhali said.
Akthar, 20, on the other hand, was particularly interested in purchasing from Zabber because they used to be neighbors, she said, adding that she was a little sad to see the block so empty.
“I grew up in this neighborhood, so every time I come here it’s so nostalgic,” Akthar said. “It’s like helping small businesses.”
Zabber, too, said he missed his fellow vendors, despite having the block’s business to himself.
“Before, when everyone was here — the customers, the interactions, all of that — it used to be fun, it used to be engaging,” Zabber said. “I miss that.”