Autorickshaws block station exit, cops silent

The Mumbai traffic police seems to believe that the road stretch outside Bandra railway station on the eastern side does not fall under their jurisdiction, as in spite of several complaints regarding the nuisance created by auto drivers daily, no action was being taken against them.

"Everyday the auto drivers park their autorickshaws in four lanes at the auto stand near the main exit on the Bandra (E) and create a complete bottleneck for the traffic and almost any given hour one can find traffic piling up to Bandra Court from railway station. Some auto drivers even stand on the staircases of the railway foot over bridge seeking passengers making it difficult for passengers to get off the bridge," shared Mahesh Iyer who works at BKC.

In fact such is the state of lawlessness that one can find auto's that are private (not black and yellow) along with some auto's that don't have headlights and are in pathetic condition but were used to ply from Bandra station to various locations in BKC as well as Bandra terminus.

Sunita James, who works with a bank at BKC, sharing her experience stated that the auto drivers crowd the exit of the stairs making it extremely difficult for women commuters to move. "As soon as you get off the bridge auto drivers almost pounce on you and begin directing you to various autorickshaws. Normally there are five people travelling in auto apart from the driver," she said adding that it was strange that why traffic department was not bothering to take action against these auto drivers.

"Our union has been regularly pointing out about this nuisance as it was us who had got the share auto stand readied at Bandra (E) when Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil was the transport minister. But soon the auto stand was taken over by these rogue auto drivers, most of whom ply auto's that have been legally scrapped and are illegal without any documents," shared Thambi Kurien working president of Mumbai rickshawmen union. He demanded that if traffic cops and RTO carry out regular drives, the situation would normalise.

He further alleged that couple of years back officials from Andheri RTO decided to take action and booked five autorickshaws that were illegal but the RTO staff, including deputy RTO Bharat Kalaskar were attacked by some people. "Post that incident even in spite of several complaints being filed by our union that a majority of auto's operating on this share auto stand are illegal as well as carrying more passengers and overcharging, no RTO official has taken any action against them," he added. He also stated that it was sad that the authorities have allowed such auto-mafia to become powerful.

Meanwhile, traffic cops claimed that their staff was posted during peak hours but the situation was difficult to manage. "We are not getting enough support from the city police to take stringent action as the auto drivers here were also backed by local politicians and have a strong group. The problem will only solve when RTO, city police and traffic police plans a joint sustained drive to book all the illegal auto's," shared a traffic cop from BKC traffic division.