Jamshedpur: Commuters faced harrowing time as Sunday as more than thousand auto drivers under the banner of Sikshit Berojgar Tempo Chalak evam Sanchalak Sangh held a massive demonstration led by Jamshedpur Former MLA Banna Gupta disrupting the traffic movement in the city.
As per their pre-decided event the auto operators parked their three wheelers at Aam Bagan ground in Sakchi to lodge their protest.
About 15,000-odd auto-rickshaws whicy ply in different routes participated in the strike leading to the inconvenience of commuters.
The auto-rickshaw operators under the banner of Shikshit Berojgar Tempo Chalak Sangh assembled at the Aam Bagan grounds in Sakchi raising slogans against the district traffic police for allegedly charging illegal fees and torturing the auto drivers.
In a bid to tighten noose of the erring autorickshaws operating without city permits, the Traffic Police gas embarked on a drive across the city. The decision to conduct regular inspection comes in due to spurt in cases of mishaps in the city.
However the auto drivers in the city have joined hands to protest the move. The drivers under the banner of Jamshedpur Shikshit Berojgaar staged demonstration and alleged that the drivers are being harassed. They demanded that those auto drivers own a permit should not be caught at the pretext of checking drive. There are around 25,000 autos which are plying on various routes in city roads at the moment.
Secretary of the sangh Shyam Kinkar Jha has raised a voice of resent against the traffic police drive. �If the police continue with their drive we would be forced to call indefinite strike of all the auto operators in the city,� said Jha. He said that drivers are being harassed in the name of no entry and no parking.
�We had asked auto drivers not operate from respective auto stand across city between 10 am and 2 pm and converge at the rally. The issue is directly related to the livelihood of drivers and we had to take the protest path putting commuters at discomfort,� said Jha.
State Congress leader SRA Rizwi Chabban said that the administration should take immediate steps to address issues of the auto drivers. He noted that when larger vehicles can run inside the city so why not tempos. District administration cannot create two laws for rich and poor.
If that happens, drivers are willing to fight. The Congress party will not at all allow the government officials to harass the drivers.
Former legislator, Banna Gupta who is the patron of the Shikshit Berojgar Tempo Chalak Sangh addressed the auto-rickshaw drivers and gave a patient hearing to their problems.
“The traffic police has launched a drive against auto-rickshaws. For violation of Motor Vehicles Act the traffic cops are charging fines from the auto-rickshaw operators. But, several auto drivers have complained of unnecessary harassment by the cops,” said Gupta