TAXIS FAIL TO GET AIRPORT RIDES AS FAMILIES CHIP IN
It was a bittersweet Id on Monday for Abdul Lateef, one of the many pre-paid taxi drivers at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad. He was finally at work after a twomonth enforced break because of the Coronavirus lockdown.
The hope that he could earn some money was tinged with a large dose of sadness as he narrated how, for the first time in their lives, his five children went without new clothes for the festival.
The 42-year-old driver, who lives in a rented house in Shaheennagar near Pahadi Shareef with his wife and children, said he was driving cabs for 16 years.
“I started when the airport was at Begumpet,” he said. “Before the lockdown, I would make about five trips a day. Today I am still waiting for my first fare. The lockdown was very tough on my family and I have run up several debts in these two months. It was such a relief when I heard the airport was reopening.”
Though cab aggregator services were not offering rides from the airport on Monday, hopes of finding rides was fading for Lateef as the day went by.
While life was tough for him and his family, the only relief was the `1,500 aid he received from the state government because he holds a white ration card. “Today, there are very few travellers and almost all of them are being picked up by their families,” he said.
Md Farooq, a 50-yearold, is also a pre-paid taxi driver at the airport. He was being viewed as the lucky one by some of his other taxi driver friends at the airport for he managed to get a fare and actually earn some money.
“Before the lockdown, each driver used to earn around `20,000 a month. We don’t know how it is going to be now and many of us are worried,” Farooq said.