Metro back, auto drivers pin hope on commuters

Gurgaon: Having had a difficult time finding commuters in the past few months, Ajit Thakur, an auto driver, is upbeat about the resumption of metro services. “In the pre-lockdown days, I used to earn Rs 1,000-1,500 a day. Then the lockdown crippled us. Since Unlock 1, I have hardly been making around Rs 500 a day. The metro reopening is a ray of hope for us,” he says.
Like Ajit, several other auto and e-rickshaw drivers are now pinning hopes on metro passengers to recoup the losses they suffered due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Before the lockdown, both the autos and e-rickshaws provided last-mile connectivity for commuters in the Millennium City. Huda City Centre metro station alone had a daily footfall of around 1.5 lakh before lockdown.
“Before the lockdown, 5,000 autos were catering to the metro commuters to and from Huda City Centre, now there are hardly 200. The metro station is where we find the bulk of passengers. But the number of passengers these days is very less. We hope the numbers will increase in the coming days,” says Pramod Kumar, another auto driver.
The resumption of metro operations has also raised hopes among the e-rickshaw operators of an increase in commuters, which would help them recover from the financial losses they suffered in the past five months. “Many of our fellow drivers converted their e-rickshaws into delivery vehicles and started working with online grocery companies to make their daily ends meet. Now, we plan to return to the metro stations,” says Ramesh Mishra.
Residents, however, said they would not be comfortable using shared autos or e-rickshaws. “I am instead planning to buy a bike to commute to the metro station to travel to my office in Noida, when the work-from-home arrangement ends,” says Manish Singh, an IT professional.