Amid complaints of share autos and taxis resorting to rash driving and ferrying extra passengers, Shashank Rao, president of Mumbai Autorickshaw Taximen’s Union, said the only solution to this menace is regularisation of the share auto stands. However, the process is mired in bureaucratic tangles, he said in a telephonic interview with HT. Through a series of articles last week, HT highlighted the issue in the city and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region.
Q. How did the share autos become a menace?
A. Till 2011, share autos were not available in huge numbers. They were only available at their dedicated slots, however, after 2011 when the job patterns changed and the eastern and western suburbs grew tremendously, extra routes that came up beyond the traditional Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) routes saw a share auto boom. It is a good model for both drivers and passengers. Drivers operate where there is a demand.They operate close to their area of residence at a fixed time. But the problem is that most of the share auto stands are illegal and the process to regularise them is so bureaucratic that the illegal stands flourish.
Q. Why is the regularisation process so bureaucratic?
A. If we want to have a legal share auto stand at any spot, the procedure requires a joint visit by an RTO officer, an ACP level traffic police officer and a BMC officer. It is nearly impossible to get all three of them for the visit. We have to keep following up. The process takes anywhere between one month to a year and a lot of times, the applications get rejected. We are demanding an auto stand at a place where share autos are flourishing illegally, but the applications get rejected. For example, recently, we applied for regularisation of share auto stand at Kurla station. After all the visits, the application was rejected by the DCP (Traffic) citing that it will cause traffic jams. But the share autos are flourishing there, so why not regularise the stand?
{{/usCountry}}A. If we want to have a legal share auto stand at any spot, the procedure requires a joint visit by an RTO officer, an ACP level traffic police officer and a BMC officer. It is nearly impossible to get all three of them for the visit. We have to keep following up. The process takes anywhere between one month to a year and a lot of times, the applications get rejected. We are demanding an auto stand at a place where share autos are flourishing illegally, but the applications get rejected. For example, recently, we applied for regularisation of share auto stand at Kurla station. After all the visits, the application was rejected by the DCP (Traffic) citing that it will cause traffic jams. But the share autos are flourishing there, so why not regularise the stand?
{{/usCountry}}Q. How will the regularisation help in tackling this problem?
A. The illegal share auto stands are managed by local goons and sometimes local politicians. These ‘managers’ collect money from illegal drivers per day. The ‘manager’ is then able to manage the authorities and hence drivers fearlessly carry extra passengers. If these stands are regularised, the fares will be fixed and signboards for these routes will be displayed. The ‘haftas’ will stop when the stand is legal. We are frequently running after the authorities and pushing for regularisation.
Q. You mentioned illegal drivers, but aren’t registered drivers also part of this practice?
A. The registered drivers have no choice but to go with the flow. Sometimes they have to pay ₹20 to ₹40 per day to local goons just to operate from a particular spot. If they try to object, they are threatened. For example, when Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil was the state transport minister, he inaugurated the share auto stand at Bandra east. Next day, when the RTO officials went to regulate it, they were attacked by the goons.
Q. What is the way ahead?
A. Share autos survive because there is demand. A lot of issues will be solved when share auto stands are regularised. There are many spots where share autos are operating well. The transport department should seriously look into the issue. They have a body for it, and they need to expedite the process of legalising share auto stands. My suggestion is, every month there should be one survey done for all the applications received and permissions should be given in a time-bound manner. This will resolve a lot of problems.
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