The Comissionerate Police may be tom-tomming its hi-tech drone surveillance to streamline traffic in Bhubaneswar but the fact remains that it has wilfully turned a blind eye to the root cause of chaos on roads, the auto-rickshaw menace, for years.
Auto-rickshaws have literally taken over the roads across the nook and corner of the State Capital with the police giving them a free run. Empowered by a complete absence of any law enforcement, auto-rickshaw drivers can be seen free-wheeling, changing lanes, dangerously overtaking, halting abruptly to pick-up passengers and intimidating the staff of other public transport system here.
The auto-rickshaw operations have virtually turned a mafia with absolute control over the roads. They give two hoots to every traffic and road safety rule. Despite, clear cut rules for maximum passenger limit of three, the rickshaws openly carry more than five. Moving at high speeds, they overtake dangerously causing serious risk to traffic movement on the roads. They crowd major thoroughfares, the periphery of important establishments, malls, cinemas causing jams.
"There is absolutely no one to question them as police are complicit with their illegalities. If a passenger raises his voice, he is misbehaved, abused and even assaulted", said Rabindra, a commuter.
Paying no heed to the norms, they park anywhere on the main road. The situation is worse at Rasulgarh, where they have encroached four different spots for either taking a break or picking up passengers. They haven't spared the space under the flyover, too!
"With the autorickshaws stationed under the flyover, very little space is left for other commuters to take a U-Turn for heading towards Vani Vihar, Cuttack-Puri Road or Rasulgarh village," a GGP Colony resident, Aditya Anshuman said.
The narrow service road between Vani Vihar and Acharya Vihar has turned a hot-spot for accidents as the autos wantonly park themselves in the middle of the road. And, the police has been totally oblivious to the menace.
Similarly, a long queue of parked auto-rickshaws can be seen near Acharya Vihar. The auto-rickshaw drivers also park their vehicles on the cycle tracks near Acharya Vihar, which were developed during the Men's Hockey World Cup last year.
Interestingly, the violation is rampant near the premises of various government offices and establishments. In front of these establishments, you will spot the errant drivers occupying the road illegally. A case in point: several three-wheelers can be seen parked right in front of the boundary wall of Odisha Fire Service Training Academy.
The road leading to the railway station is no less chaotic, thanks to the auto-rickshaws parked there. Some other areas, where auto-rickshaw drivers have made unauthorised parking stands, are Kalpana Square, CRPF Square, Baramunda, Damana Square, Patia, among others.
There over 30,000 auto-rickshaws in the City. However, police don't have any record of the drivers.
It may appear ironical, but the Commissionerate police had launched a process to register all auto-rickshaw drivers in. The drivers were provided with identity cards, which had details about their vehicle registration numbers, their names and mobile number, along with two uniforms.
They were mandated to display every detail on their vehicles for passengers. Violators were booked and penalised. But, the initiative met an unnatural death in a very short span of time for unknown reasons.
As verification and registration process is no longer continued, auto-rickshaw drivers are not applying for stage carriage permit, insurance, pollution certificate, vehicle fitness certificate, and others. Some auto-rickshaw drivers are plying without driving license, police sources themselves admit.
Twin City Commissioner of Police Sudhansu Sarangi said he has held discussions with various auto-rickshaw associations and asked them not to halt in the middle of a road.
"Surprise checks to verify documents of auto-rickshaws drivers and their three-wheelers and overloading of vehicles is being conducted in various areas," Traffic ACP Kishore Panigrahi claimed, adding that most of the auto-rickshaw drivers are not applying for stage carriage permit and insurance policies.
An interesting admission of complicity, it is indeed, for the police allows such blatant violations without taking any action against them.