IT firms to staff: Use the Metro when it starts, we’ll pick you up

The Millennium City registers more than 45,000 new vehicles every year. More than 40,000 people, who work in various IT companies, commute to Gurgaon from Delhi daily.

The Millennium City registers more than 45,000 new vehicles every year. More than 40,000 people, who work in various IT companies, commute to Gurgaon from Delhi daily.

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Rather than waiting for the civic authorities to find a solution to huge traffic jams, as a result of heavy traffic, a body of IT companies, including multinationals, is planning to take things in its own hands - using a shuttle service for ferrying their employee from Metro stations.

Subinder Khurana, co-chairman of NASSCOM Gurgaon Council, said IT companies and ITeS (BPOs and call centers) were the most affected entities due to huge traffic jams. He claimed their productivity is hit with employees reporting to their workplaces late.

So companies such as Genpact, Cognigent, IBM, American Express and other multinational IT firms have come together to form 'Cybercity Society’ under the aegis of NASSCOM Gurgaon Council to address infrastructure issues.

“We have about 35,000-40,000 employees coming to Gurgaon from Delhi every day. About one lakh employees come to Gurgaon from Delhi on a daily basis for various purposes,” he added.

The companies have begun promoting the use of the forthcoming Metro service instead of cabs and buses in their bid to reduce the traffic load.

Gurgaon Police Commissioner S. S. Deswal said, “We already have 6 lakh registered vehicles and about 45,000 vehicles including cars, two and three-wheelers and trucks are added to it every year. These vehicles need 2.75 lakh square metres of parking space which the city doesn’t have.”

Recently, the police department, Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon, Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) and NASSCOM Gurgaon Council held a joint meeting to look for solution to the poor physical infrastructure of the millennium city.

The police commissioner had requested the civic agencies to do their bit by creating the required parking space.

“We are taking the number of police personnel from the existing 250 to 500 by October. But more number of traffic policemen alone will not address traffic issues. We need broader roads and parking lots to ease traffic,” he had said.

The civic authorities had said that 30 multilevel parking sites had been earmarked in Gurgaon. HUDA had said that a majority of the roads were being widened and slip roads were being created to decongest the crossings.