The Tribune: Ludhiana: Saturday, August 05, 2017.
Despite the
fact that Ludhiana is the most polluted city in the state, possibly in the
entire Northern region, diesel-run three-wheelers, one of the worst polluting
mass transport means, are having a free run in the city.
Thanks to the
poor or rather nil enforcement of traffic rules and pollution norms by the
Transport Department and the city traffic police. In the absence of a robust
and adequate alternative public transport system, it seems three-wheelers have
become an evil in the industrial hub of the state.
Surprisingly,
information provided by the Commissioner of Police under the Right to
Information Act reveals that the city traffic police challaned only 556
auto-rickshaws for plying without permits and 630 for operating without
pollution check certificate during the past seven months.
This despite
the fact that the Punjab and Haryana High Court had imposed a ban on issuing
new permits to diesel-run auto-rickshaws in Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Amritsar in
July 2009.
Besides, the
issue of massive air pollution caused by diesel-run motor vehicles, including
three-wheelers and other means of public transport in Ludhiana and Amritsar, is
already pending before the National Green Tribunal.
Responding to
information sought under the RTI Act by Rohit Sabharwal, president of the
Council of RTI Activists, the police had further intimated that during the past
seven and a half months, challans were issued to 79 buses for use of pressure
horns, besides 13 buses and 62 commercial transport vehicles for overloading.
That the
traffic police found fault only with 1,100 odd three-wheelers during the past
seven and a half months when more than 40,000 such vehicles, most of them diesel
operated, were plying on city roads is in itself ridiculous if not shocking.
The fact that
the number of diesel-operated auto-rickshaws had more than doubled since 2009
when the High Court imposed a ban on the issue of new permits proved the total
lack of enforcement of rules by the traffic police.
Although
nobody is prepared to go on record, it is a known fact that giving protection
to illegally run three-wheelers in the city has become a lucrative business for
certain self-styled and opportunistic political leaders as well as some
policemen, some of whom are said to be operating fleet of such vehicles.
“Then almost
without failing, unions formed by three-wheeler operators at different places
are headed by politically connected persons, who raise a lot of hue and cry,
whenever the police or the Transport Department launch a crackdown on illegal
auto-rickshaws,” said a police official requesting anonymity.