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Chandigarh residents suffer as cab fares surge amid strike by drivers
The strike by cab drivers drove surge pricing to more than two times in the evening, hitting users, especially office-goers, hard
People looking for taxis were a harried lot on Tuesday as several cab drivers went on strike, causing the surge pricing by cab aggregators to shoot up exponentially.
While many local cab drivers went on strike on the call of the Cab Auto Sanyukt Morcha, to push the administration to the enforce the recently notified hiked fares, several drivers aligned with cab aggregators like Ola and Uber also joined the strike for their demands.
Apart from enforcement of new fares, the morcha wants the administration to also impose these charges on cab aggregators to bring parity in the market. Besides, it has demanded additional fare of 5 kilometres for going to destinations on the outskirts of the city like the airport and Panjab University, and special facility for pick and drop at the airport and railway station like that allowed in Delhi.
On the other hand, drivers working for cab aggregators sought relief from penalty for halting at no-stoppage roads across Chandigarh and information about the destination before the trip is assigned to them.
The strike by them drove surge pricing to more than two times in the evening, hitting users, especially office-goers, hard.
Arshpreet of Sector 15 said she was charged ₹218 for a cab trip back home from Sector 43, which would normally cost ₹100. Similarly, Akhil Arora complained he had to pay ₹420 to travel from Phase 7 to Phase 10 in Mohali against the usual ₹110.
A resident of Sector 49, Samridhi Roy said she was forced to hail an auto as the cab fares were quite steep. “Due to surge pricing, the fare to travel from Sector 49 to Sector 10 shot up to ₹600, compared to ₹150-200 normally,” she added.
Meanwhile, the protesting drivers gathered near the Sector 43 ISBT and other places where the volume of cab users is usually high. Customers complained the protesters were not allowing other cab and auto drivers to enter these areas.
Morcha’s convener Vikram Singh Pundir said they submitted a memorandum to the State Transport Authority (STA) office in Sector 18 and will organise further protests if their demands were not met.
Meanwhile, auto drivers had also announced a “chakka jam”, but most of them continued to operate normally. Raju Kumar Rao, an auto driver, said, “I was at home since the morning, not intending to take passengers, but I saw many other autos running. I wanted to protest, but it is unfair if other drivers run their business as usual.”
