Prayagraj: Autorickshaw owner develops innovative way to keep passengers safe

PRAYAGRAJ: Faced with the challenge of steep fall in number of passengers using hired mode of conveyance during Covid-19 pandemic, a 48-year-old autorickshaw owner of the Sangam city, Sanjeev Singh has improvised his vehicle in such a way that it will protect the passengers coming in direct contact with each other while riding in his rickshaw.
In his unique innovative technique, Singh, a resident of Baihrana locality, has made partitions within his vehicle in such a way that each of the four passengers do not come in direct contact with each other. A thick plastic sheet protects each other from getting infected.
Not only this, apart from ensuring that his passengers are safe while riding his rickshaw, Sanjeev also ensures that he too does not comes in direct contact with his passengers for which he has placed a sheet between the driver’s seat and the back seat.
His ‘special’ auto plies on the route from Bank road (near Allahabad University) to Alopidevi temple. “In all the phases of lockdown, it was only the savings of the household which kept us alive otherwise I was on the verge of getting broken had it not been my wife Archana and the only son Abhinav. But, during Unlock1.0 and now 2.0, things were almost the same was there were only few people coming out on road and sitting in shared auto, primary reason for which was obviously scare of getting infected, he added.
At the same time, my family was worried of me getting infected as there are number of people sitting in the autorickshaw and anyone among them could be a corona positive case, although asymptomatic.
“Thinking of a way to keep everyone at minimal risk, I the thought struck me and I made these ‘compartments’ within my vehicle, one separating me from the passengers and two other which keeps them away from getting into direct contact amongst each other”, said Singh, who has studied till intermediate from a small government school in Shehdol (Madhya Pradesh) but affords the studies of his only son in a decent school of the city.
Apart from this, Singh also ensures that every hook and corner of his autorickshaw is sanitised, before and after the passenger enters or exists. Besides, each of the four (maximum) passengers are sanitised before touching anything in the rickshaw (metal parts etc) and he again sanitises their (passengers) hands before taking money from them.
He does not allow anyone without wearing mask to sit in his vehicle. “The daily earning has come down from Rs 700-800 to around Rs 250, but that doesn’t mean that I charge more for providing the additional facilities of keeping my passengers safe”, he says.
“One has to understand that now this crisis is here to stay for many months and wearing mask and following other norms like social distancing and sanitising ourselves are the only effective tools, we cannot sit idle, who will feed our families”, asks Singh.