Week after auto drivers’ stir, Amritsar MC suspends RAAHI project

Charanjit Singh Teja

Amritsar, September 14

After protests by diesel auto-rickshaw drivers last week, the municipal corporation, the district administration and traffic police have suspended the RAAHI project without official announcement. The Rejuvenation of Auto Rickshaws in Amritsar through Holistic Intervention (RAAHI), projected as the dream project of CM Bhagwant Mann, has been dropped on the instructions of the ruling Aam Adami Party leadership.

The Smart City and Municipal Corporation authorities have been working to implement the RAAHI project for the last one and a half years. A number of fairs, camps and awareness programmes had been conducted throughout the year. After spending a huge amount and human resource, the MC did not get good response from auto drivers, most of who were not willing to buy subsidised e-autos.

There are over 10,000 illegal diesel autos being operated in the city. During the last few years, illegal battery-operated e-auto-rickshaws have been the major mode of transportation for city people. These vehicles are not registered with any government agency and there is no data available about e-autorickshaws, commonly known as “battery rickshaw”. According to information, the number of e-autorickshaws would not be less than 10,000. There would be another challenge for the authorities to register ill-designed e-autorickshaws with the Regional Transport Authority.

“All diesel auto-rickshaws being plied on city roads are illegal as the National Green Tribunal had imposed a ban on the registration of diesel auto-rickshaws in Amritsar in 2009. These auto-rickshaws are registered from the periphery tehsils and they cannot operate it in the city. But the authorities cannot take any action against these illegal vehicles as operators block roads. The MC is helpless in implementing the government’s project to save the environment,” said an MC official. “After the shelving of the street vending project, this was the second setback to the municipal corporation. The MC had spent a huge amount of money on the survey of vendors, allotting numbers, demarking the smart markets, arranging funds and bank loans. But when MC teams visited the bus stand to shift vends, area MLA Jeewanjot Kaur came to the support of the vendors and the street vending project was suspended. The RAAHI project has met the same fate. The government is unable to implement any decision due to votebank politics,” said Kuljit Singh, a local activist.