Cops allot 24 routes for share autos in Gzb city
The traffic police on Wednesday identified 24 different routes for share autos and said that the route names will be inscribed on them. The police added that the share autos will only be allowed to ply on their designated route.
Meanwhile, raising objections to the move taken by the traffic police to decongest the city, the members of the auto unions said they will move the high court and seek legal remedy.
According to official estimates, Ghaziabad has around 15,000 autos that ply on a shared basis on various routes across the city. The traffic police identified 24 different routes that include six routes from Kaushambi, four from Mohan Nagar, six from the Old bus stand, three from Lal Kuan, one from ALT Centre in Raj Nagar and two from Meerut Crossing, among others.
“The route names will be inscribed on the autos and they will be allowed to ply only on a specific route. Otherwise, we will take tough action. The transport department officials have also been briefed about the 24 routes. The idea is to decongest the city roads as the majority of auto drivers ply on routes where they get maximum passengers,” said Ramanand Kushwaha, superintendent of police (traffic).
The transport department
officials added that an auto will be allowed to travel up to a
25-kilometre radius from a specific point of origin.
“For this, we had earlier identified 18 different originating points from where autos can ply. These points were defined about six months ago. We want to decongest the already busy routes and have evenly spread the distribution of autos to different parts of the city. From the earlier 18 points, the traffic police have now increased them to 24,” said Arun Kumar, regional transport officer.
“We have a limit of issuing permits to about 15,000 autos and new permits are being issued from the 18 identified points. It has come to light that many auto owners have not renewed their permits for the last several years and these will now be cancelled and new permits will be issued to autos from the 18 specified points,” Kumar added further.
Autos are the most common means of intra-city commute for thousands of passengers in Ghaziabad. They generally operate on a shared basis with the fares fixed by the transport department. “The new concept of routes by the traffic police is not feasible for auto owners. It is so because we pay yearly licencing fee to the corporation and our drivers have also suffered in the last two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic. If the routes are defined, we will not be able to ferry passengers on longer routes and they will have to change autos for all such routes,” said Dilshad Ahmad, president of Ghaziabad autorickshaw chalak sangh.
Ahmad said fares have not been revised since two years and the increase in fuel price has added to their misery. “When the transport department has given points and areas of operation, the route scheme by the police is not justified”, he said.