Of three-wheeled rogues called autos

Posted By Pooja ChakrabartyBIO Total 4 posts

January 6th, 2009

Kolkata. Capital of West Bengal. Once upon a time, India’s culture capital; now, it is the country’s ‘Cancer Capital’. And each year when winter traipses in, it’s easy to see why. The fog ruling yesteryear’s winters is no more. It’s been dethroned by its 21st century counterpart – smog. Bringing on coughing fits, burning the eye, ‘as pure as the air’ is a term we can no longer use. Hospital rolls are increasingly being filled by patients suffering from one kind of respiratory disease or another. Cancer, the dreaded health monster, is also on the rise. The reason: air pollution. One of the culprits: Two-stroke autos and the deadly katatel cocktail they run on that’s leaving behind a trail of potential hospital cases.

They’ve been making frontpage news with astounding regularity of late. But it isn’t just the katatel controversy that’s making auto rides a daily danger.

Imagine the shortest route to your destination. It’ll take you there in ten minutes flat. But unfortunately, it’s a one-way road and the traffic is moving the other way. The normal tendency would be to take the other, longer route. But ‘normal’ isn’t ‘likely’ if your vehicle of the day is an auto rickshaw. Your auto driver looks this way and that. He’s checking for traffic cops who might cause him trouble. There’s one around the corner, but the driver apparently doesn’t notice. He swerves on to the one-way street. A police van passes the rogue vehicle, but the cops inside don’t even spare a passing glance.

You end up reaching with several minutes to spare. Convenient, you say. Aye, that it is. But it’s breaking the rules too. And risky.

Why you need to speak up.

Posted By Sebabrata BanerjeeBIO Total 9 posts

January 6th, 2009

They grossly violate traffic rules. They run on adulterated fuel baptised as Katatel. Their vehicles spew venomous exhaust that causes Lung Cancer. They misbehave with passengers because they are organised. They cock a snook at the administration for their unions are affiliated to ruling and opponent parties. And they get a cover from police as they have the blessings of the WB Transport Minister.

The minister interprets court order to his convenience, seeks an extension of the two-stroke auto-ban deadline that his department had set before the Calcutta High Court approved it. He doesn’t seem to fear a Contempt of Court, nor do his blessed ones. There are thousands of them who don’t have permissions to scour the city roads—their affiliation to CITU fends off the peril.

Are they the agents of doom? Are they the dark harbingers of anarchy? The Government is going slow, despite knowing that their notion of triumph among the anti-ban elements may soon propagate to the segment of other vehicles—old and perilously polluting—whose owners are now waiting to see the outcome of the protest with crossed fingers. There is a deadline set by the Calcutta High Court for them as well— 31 March, 2009.

There are two possibilities. One: Many more rounds of violence on city streets, fatal rise of vehicular pollution, piercing gazes of innocent, terminally ill children who trusted us for their wellbeing. Two: Clean air, streets free of old, crumbling vehicles, happy and healthy faces of children. The State Government may forget its responsibilities, but can we?

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