Ambulance drivers in Karnataka double up as taxi drivers, bootleggers on the sly
Several ambulance drivers have been caught smuggling alcohol or ferrying passengers instead of patients during the lockdown to check the spread of coronavirus.
Amid the lockdown that has turned roads across the country into desolate strips of asphalt, many ambulance drivers in Karnataka are trying to mint money by using their vehicles as taxis and for bootlegging.
Late Tuesday night, when a police patrol on national highway 13 in Chitradurga district saw an ambulance racing away, it did not initially pay any attention because the sight of ambulances ferrying sick people during the lockdown is a common sight.
But when Sub Inspector Manjunath Sidappa and a constable later saw the same ambulance parked some distance away on the highway with a van close to it, they got suspicious and decided to investigate. When they checked the ambulance belonging to Horakere Deverapura (or H D Pura) primary health center, they found that instead of carrying sick people it was ferrying alcohol. The van was the conduit to shift the alcohol to interior villages where it is sold at exorbitant prices to desperate tipplers.
Four people including ambulance driver Subaan, lab technician Santosh and two people driving the van Girish and Jeevan were arrested. They were selling liquor sachets which normally cost Rs 90 per sachet at Rs 500 to those desperate for a drink. The four have been arrested, the ambulance seized and a case registered.
Chitradurga’s superintendent of police G Radhika made it clear that “action will be taken against anybody violating the lockdown.”
Across Karnataka, ambulances are being used for purposes other than what they are meant for ever since the lockdown began. On 19 April, seven people were arrested from an ambulance which was carrying them from Puttur to Mysore. The ambulance was detained after cops at a checkpoint in Dakshina Kannada district got suspicious by the presence of several men in the ambulance. The men later confessed that they were getting a ride in the ambulance to ‘escape the lockdown.’
Inter-district movement is banned and Karnataka has sealed its borders with all neighbouring states except for emergency traffic movement.
On 13 April, Lingadahalli police had detained an ambulance travelling from Bangalore to Chikmagaluru. The ambulance driver had taken Rs 28,000 from five people who had wanted to go to Ganguru village of Chikmagaluru from Bangalore. The ambulance driver had managed to evade all check posts till Tarikere where some policemen became suspicious because an ambulance with Bengaluru registration was entering a remote village. All of them were not just taken into custody but a case registered and sent to quarantine.
A senior health and family welfare department officer speaking to HT who did not want to be identified as he is not authorized to speak to the media said, ”There may have been some instances of misuse of essential services like ambulance either to ferry people or liqour. In all cases which come to our notice we take the strictest action possible under law. Licenses of such ambulances are suspended and cases registered.”