In response to widely shared footage on Friday that showed a vendor selling vada pav in Outer Delhi being held by police, the Delhi police said that the vendor had not been arrested and that no complaint had been filed against her.
Chandrika Dixit, popularly known as “Vada Pav Girl”, has been running a food stall in the Mongolpuri area for a few months, police said. A few days ago, the vada pav seller posted a video showing an altercation between her and locals while she was organising a community feast or bhandara near her stall.
Police said that her stall was being run without permission from the municipal body and attracted a large number of customers as well as other online content creators. They claimed that traffic issues in the neighborhood were caused by the crowd that gathered at her kiosk.
Police said they received complaints from residents about a traffic jam in the area after she organised a bhandara on the roadside. When the police team reached the spot, she misbehaved with the officials, they added. Her stall was seized and she was taken to the police station.
DCP Outer Delhi stated that Ms. Dixit was never taken into custody and that no charge has been filed.
With more than 300,000 Instagram followers, Ms. Dixit is a street food vendor who owns a Vada Pav kiosk in Delhi. She became viral after she was spotted sobbing after a phone conversation with an MCD representative, alleging that they had threatened to take down her stall.
