Crooked rickshaw-drivers and lackadaisical RTO and why Raj Thackeray has a point.

While the whole nation chooses to rant against Raj Thackeray and the antics of his MNS, I’ll play the Devil’s advocate and argue his case against UP wallahs and Biharis. I do not object to these guys monopolizing the taxi and rickshaw driving jobs in the city of Bombay. The constitution grants every Indian the right to settle and work anywhere in the Union of India. These guys are working hard to feed their families. They are doing the right thing by toiling hard to sustain themselves. They have also made the choice to not pick up guns and fight against the Republic of India like the Naxalites. Furthermore, they are far from the criminals who choose to run begging rackets by exploiting little children instead of earning their bread by the sweat of their brow.

However, the above facts do not justify the swindling of customers according to the whims and fancies of taxi-drivers and rickshaw drivers. Read the following incidents to understand what citizens of Bombay, New Bombay and Thane, Marathi and non-Marathi people included, undergo on a regular basis.

1. I stay at a place called Saket Complex in Thane. It costs about INR 19 or 20 by rickshaw to come to my residence from Thane railway station and vice-versa from a place called CIDCO about 3 mins away from the station. From the station, it will cost you INR 25-30. Once on a Sunday evening, there were no rickshaws near Saket Complex. I was waiting for one. With me, there was a slightly aged couple. Their manner of dress suggested that they were village folks. A rickshaw came by and this couple asked him to take them to Thane station before I could. I asked the couple if we could share the fare because I had to go to the same place. They agreed. I asked the rickshaw driver to take us to CIDCO. The couple looked confused but I assured them that we would reach where they intended to. On reaching CIDCO, the fare came to INR 20 which we split into half. This couple was surprised. This is how the conversation took place.

The elderly man: Bees rupaiya? Itna hi paisa hota hai! (20 rupees? That’s all it costs?)
Me: Jee haan. Itna hi hota hai Saket se yahan tak. (Yes sir. That’s all it costs from Saket to here.)
The elderly man: Hum jab aaye they, tab hamse 70 rupaiya liye they. (When we had come, we had been charged INR 70 for the richshaw.)
Me: Kya? Sattar rupaiya kaise? (What? How were you charged Rs. 70?)
The elderly man: Jee whoh rickshewallah bole they ke ek seat ka 35 rupaiya hota hai. (The rickshaw driver told us that they charge INR 35 per head.)

I was shocked. This couple was fleeced. Judging from their accent, they were definitely UP wallahs or Biharis. We started walking towards the station.

Me: Kya aapko malum nahi tha yahan pe paisa kitna hota hai? Kya aap yahan pe pehli baar aaye hain? [Didn’t you know how much it (rickshaw fares) costs here? Is this the first time that you have visited this place?}
The elderly lady: Jee haan. Yahan pe shaadi thee. Hum Mira Road se aaye hain. Thane toh pehli baar hi aana hua hai. Humare pehchaan wale Saket mein rehte hain. (Yes. There was a wedding here. We have come from Mira Road. It is the first time that we have come to Thane. We have friends who live in Saket.)
Me: Jab aap aagli baar aayenge, toh CIDCO se rickshaw lijiye ga. Station se mat lijiye ga. (When you come here next time, take a rickshaw from station. Do not take one from the station.)
The elderly man: Hum toh wapas yahan aayenge hee nahi. Koi kaam hee nahi hai yahan pe. (We won’t come here again. We don’t have any business here.)

We exchanged good-byes and parted ways.

2. A Gujarati gentleman from our neighborhood once complained about a similar incident with his guest. His friend had been charged Rs. 50 from Thane station to Saket Complex.

3. Some weeks ago, there were severe traffic problems on the road from CIDCO to Saket. It generally takes 10 mins to get from CIDCO to Saket. That day it took vehicles more than 45 mins. So I decided to walk home instead of waiting for the traffic to clear out. Half-way through the road, I asked a rickshaw fellow to take me to Saket. He agreed. He did not start the meter. I asked him why. He said, “Madam, fixed rate, tees rupaiya. (Rs. 30)” Preposterous! I got off immediately. That ride should not have cost me for than Rs. 15. Later, as I continued walking, a Bengali couple who live in the neighbourhood, called me out from a rickshaw and offered me a lift. We got down at Saket. On getting off, I realized that it was the same rickshaw fellow who tried to dupe me. The Bengali gentleman was the one who got duped instead. Arguments yielded no result as the rickshaw-wallah had been given a Rs. 50 note. He returned Rs. 20 and drove off. This rickshaw fellow was definitely from the group that Raj Thackeray is ranting against.

4. Once, a neighbour and I took a rickshaw from Mulund station to Kopri Bridge. My neighbour regularly goes to Kopri Bridge to cross over from Mulund into Thane but I had never been there. Suddenly my neighbour confronted the driver and asked him where he was taking us. He replied Kopri Bridge. She told him that he was wrong. The argument revealed that he thought that Kopri Bridge and Mulund-Thane check-naka were the same place! The two places are nearly 3 kms apart. Had I been alone, I might have landed up at the check-naka instead of Kopri Bridge. It would have been a complete waste of time and money. The driver was again either an UP-wallah or a Bihari.

5. A co-worker Malyalee Borivali resident visited Thane sometime ago. He had to visit a place near Malhaar theatre. This theatre is roughly a kilometer away from Thane railway station and Thane bus depot. He does not know Thane. This guy got charged INR 70 instead of the usual INR 12 to 15 for a rickshaw ride from Thane station to Malhaar. I asked him how the driver spoke Hindi and the reference was towards India’s north.

6. My office is located near the Nehru Planetarium, Worli, Bombay. In case if you decide to come to this place in a taxi from Byculla station, you have to tell the taxi driver to take you to a well-known hotel called the Copper Chimney or to the Lotus or to Atria Mall or to Poonam Chambers. There have been multiple occasions on which the taxi driver has told me that he does not any of the 5 landmarks I previously mentioned! The driver literally asked me to keep giving him instructions.

I cannot help but feel from personal and second-hand experience that Raj Thackeray has a point, a very valid one at that. No matter how much I despise the violence that his thugs carry out, I have to admit that he has voiced the concerns of civilians everywhere in the city, Marathi or otherwise. Most of the traffic police personnel and RTO officials (I will not say all) lack scruples and neglect duty. They issue licenses to rickshaw drivers from other states although the Motor Vehicles Act clearly prohibits this. The driver has to be domiciled in the State that he/she is working. This means that someone who has lived all his/her life in Maharashtra cannot drive rickshaws and taxis in UP/ Bihar/ Delhi, etc. and vice versa. This is a central government act. This seems unfair but as of now is the law. Even more important is that the law requires the driver to know the area that he works in. This is essential to protect travelers from incidents mentioned in point 4 and 6 and yet the RTO does not take the necessary pains to do what the law asks of it. Raj Thackeray had raised questions regarding the integrity of the RTO on the same issue during a rally in Thane. His question was, “Don’t you have any shame? How can you neglect duty?” He had very clearly stated that we can be assured that if a commuter visits a locality for the first time, he/she will be over-charged by a Bihari / UP wallah rickshaw / taxi driver as described in points 1, 2, 3 and 5. The solution to this is not MNS-style brutal histrionics. The MNS got a well-deserved black eye when its MLAs were suspended for turning the Maharashtra legislative assembly into a wrestling ring. Fist fights are not the answer to everything. Cheats are bound to take advantage of the irresponsible attitude of the law enforcers and of the fact that most commuters hassled by traveling to and fro to work or slightly lost in an unknown area will not do much to confront them. The Chief Minister of Maharastra, Mr. Ashok Chavan was right when he spoke of the strict implementation of the Motor Vehicles Act. Not just Maharashtra, all states should do this. The taxi unions protest every diktat issued by the State with regards to the use of Marathi which is in fact very practical. I wonder what answers they have to this abominable behaviour of their members. The Motor Vehicles Act has to be strictly implemented by the law enforcers themselves. That is what they are paid for. No one deserves to be cheated even if the cheat has poverty as an excuse.

P.S.: I choose to say Bombay because the origin of the traditional English name Bombay holds that it was derived from a Portuguese name meaning "good bay", Bombain or Bombahia. The prosperity of this city commenced because it was identified as an excellent harbour, not because of the local goddess Mumba.