Despite resumption of trains, auto drivers face livelihood crisis

Strap: Say they have to furnish road permit documents, face parking issues at rly station

Box: Their concern

Rakesh Kumar, an auto driver, said, as per the new design, the railways is in the process of upgrading the seating arrangement at the site where we used to park autos before lockdown last year. It is also going ahead with the plans to set up a museum at the TTE rest house, situated behind the parking area. The railways had conveyed about the beautification plan to auto and taxi operators here. This would reduce the parking area, he said, adding that taxi operators were not against the plan, but it should not be at the cost of the livelihood of auto drivers.

Box 2

Two weekly trains likely to be restored

The railways is likely to restore two weekly trains Amritsar-Kolkata and Amritsar-Dibrugarh from March 5. Four pairs of Janshtabdi, Paschim Express, Frontier (Golden Temple) and Shahid Express ply daily. Besides, two weekly trains of Amritsar-Jalpaiguri and Amritsar-Nagpur have also been plying. It was only recently that the daily Amritsar – Pathankot train was restored. All of them pass through Amritsar-Tarn Taran-Beas as the activists of the Kisan Mazdoor Sangarsh Committee continue to block Amritsar-Delhi rail route near Jandiala railway station, which is situated nearly 10 km from the holy city.

Neeraj Bagga

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, March 2

Resumption of trains at the Amritsar Railway Station (ARS) has failed to bring cheer to auto drivers who have been out of job for nearly a year.

Jagpreet Singh, an auto driver, said, it’s been nearly a year after some trains were denied entry to the railway station. He stated that initially, as many as 240 autos were allowed to enter the railway station nut now, not even a single auto is permitted to go inside the railway station which has hit their livelihood.

“When we went to meet a senior official at Ferozepur in this regard, they asked us to furnish some documents along with the road permit.” He lamented that the majority of the auto drivers do not have such permits but the railway officials are insisting for the same. He accused them of deliberately doing so to deny them the parking space inside the ARS.

Rakesh Kumar, another auto driver, said, as per the new design, the railways is in the process of upgrading the seating arrangement at the site where we used to park autos before lockdown last year. It is also going ahead with the plans to set up a museum at the TTE rest house, situated behind the parking area. The railways had conveyed about the beautification plan to auto and taxi operators here. This would reduce the parking area, he said, adding that taxi operators were not against the plan, but it should not be at the cost of livelihood of auto drivers.

Similarly, Manjit Singh, a leader of the taxi union, said, “As many as 40 taxi drivers have been paying Rs 1,200 per month as licence fee to the railways for parking their vehicles.” Taxi operators were asked to restrict themselves to 60-metre area, which is enough to park about 10 four-wheelers. Earlier, they had been given enough area to park about 40 taxis.

Divisional Railway Manager, Ferozepur Division, Rajesh Aggarwal, said the beautification and development of the local railway station was undergoing. He added that all sections would be assigned suitable space in the station as per the norms.