October 9, 2002	Wednesday	Sha’aban 2, 1423

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RAWALPINDI, Oct 8: Commuters faced severe inconvenience on Tuesday, after the local transport authorities impounded about 850 vehicles, plying on different routes, so that these could be used for election duty on October 10.

Big gatherings were seen on all the bus stops on Murree Road and in Islamabad because the Regional Transport Authority, with the help of traffic police, impounded most of the vehicles.

Most of the people had to hire taxis or rikshas to go to their work places. They criticised the government for adding miseries to them while impounding the vehicles.

The impounded vehicles were taken to Jinnah Park near the district courts along with their drivers, where they would be kept till October 10.

The local transport union leaders told Dawn that the administration had so far impounded about 850 vehicles. He said these vehicles would be used to bring polling staff and elections material to the polling stations.

The secretary-general of Shaheen Wagon and Mini-Bus Union Rawalpindi-Islamabad, Shabir Bangash, said the transport authorities had made an agreement with public transport owners that their vehicles would be hired on fixed rates whenever needed for official duty, but now they had grabbed the vehicles by force three days before the polling day without payments. “It is a joke with transporters and commuters that vehicles have been impounded three days before the elections,” he regretted.

Sources said the RTA secretary was given the task to arrange about 900 vehicles for the polling day.

A police official said the vehicles had been impounded throughout the country for election purpose.

According to some drivers and conductors, the police forced the passengers, including women, to leave the wagons and ordered them to travel through any other means.

Aftab Ahmed, an owner of a wagon, told Dawn that he purchased a new wagon on October 5, but the police stopped his vehicle when it was on the road and took it into custody. “My family may started facing starvation, if my vehicle remained off the road,” he said.

Our Correspondent from Taxila adds: Hundreds of public transport vehicles including buses, coaches, vans and pick ups were impounded on Tuesday by the police and the district administration in Taxila, Wah Cantt and Hassanabdal for October 10 elections. The students, working women, government employees and elderly people suffered inconvenience due to non-availability of transport on Tuesday.

It was observed that in many cases the passengers were dragged out of the vehicles in the middle of their journey. The local courts and police stations were looking like bus stands after hundreds of vehicles were parked there. Besides public transport, vehicles of different public and private organizations were also impounded.

The transporters are of the view that the local administration and police have impounded their vehicles a couple of days before the polls which resulted in the financial losses to them.