Maharashtra government’s Rs 1,500 relief remains elusive for auto drivers

NAGPUR: Maharashtra government’s one-time relief of Rs1,500 to each autorickshaw driver remains a non-starter in the city. A technical snag has prevented autorickshaw drivers from uploading documents like permit, Aadhaar card linked with bank account, driving licence since May 22. Secondly, the regional transport offices (city and east) are yet to be authorized to approve the claims.
The state government had announced a relief package of Rs107 crore for the 7.5 lakh permit holder autorickshaw drivers in April when the lockdown-like restrictions were imposed to curb the spread of Covid-19. TOI had recently reported that there were no signs of the autorickshaw drivers getting the “meager” relief even a month after the announcement.
After this, a website was created for enrolling the drivers. The government also roped in a private bank (ICICI Bank) to disburse the money and a training session was held for autorickshaw drivers’ union on May 21 on filling the online forms.
The procedure started on May 22 but not a single autorickshaw driver has been able to submit the form. The system is consistently down since Saturday when the portal was launched, said autorickshaw drivers.
Officials from the regional transport offices (both city and east RTO) confirmed that no autorickshaw driver has received the relief so far though the proces was launched on Saturday. “The transport commissioner office has not yet given regional offices the rights to approve the online applications. Unless the rights are given, we cannot process the request any further,” said an official requesting anonymity.
The drivers termed the Rs1,500 one-time relief as ‘Unt ke muh mein jeera’ (as insignificant as a drop in the ocean). Instead, they are demanding tax rebate and waiver of monthly instalments of three-wheelers loans for the lockdown-like period.
In June 2020, the Vidarbha Autorickshaw Federation with over 75,000 members from 11 districts of the region had moved the Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court seeking a direction to state government to pay them a monthly allowance of Rs5,000 as most of them were on “the verge of starvation” following the lockdown last year.