THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Talks between Transport Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan and the Joint Forum of Trade Unions here on Monday failed to arrive at a consensus on the autorickshaw and taxi workers’ demand for a fare revision.
According to the joint action committee, the Transport Minister refused to accept the unions’ demand for decreasing the distance covered under minimum charge of Rs 20 to 1.25 km from the current 1.5 km.
Thiruvanchoor pointed out that the fare revision was effected on the basis of the Justice M Ramachandran Commission report and it could not be revised again as it was a decision made by the Cabinet.
The Transport Minister also reportedly asked the auto and taxi drivers to go through the Commission report which would be available online from Tuesday and come up with recommendations.
The trade unions are expected to sit for another rounds of talks with the Minister after studying the report.
CITU’s Kadakampally Surendran, AITUC’s Pattom Sasidharan and J Udayabhanu, BMS’ K Gangadharan and UTUC’s T S Vijayan attended the meeting with the minister while INTUC representatives stayed away.