KARACHI, Sept 18: Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal MNAs Mohammad Hussain Mehanti and Laeeq Khan have condemned the city government’s ban prohibiting two-stroke rickshaws from plying the main arteries of the city on the pretext of environmental pollution.
Terming it a “new tool of exploitation of poor workers engaged in the business,” they said it would further open the doors of corruption as after some time, all such actions gave way to business as usual.
The sentiments expressed by the MMA parliamentarians are similar to the stand taken by Awami National Party Sindh chapter President Shahi Syed and leaders of the National Transport Ittehad, who have also condemned the CDGK’s decision.
A few days ago City Nazim Mustafa Kamal had announced a ban on two-stroke rickshaws operating from Sohrab Goth to Tower via Sharah-i-Pakistan and from Guru Mandir to Tower via M.A. Jinnah Road in order to avoid traffic jams and remove one of the major causes of noise and environmental pollution.
The CDGK’s decision was welcomed by the Pakistan Medical Association. The PMA pointed out that rickshaws generate noise from 95db to 110 db, which is harmful to human hearing while adding that environmental pollution caused by rickshaws is also extremely harmful to health.
No alternative arrangement
Opponents of the ban are of the view that without providing alternate avenues of employment, such a ban would further add to the army of unemployed people whose miseries are being compounded by sky-rocketing prices of essential commodities.
According to Shahi Syed, over 54,000 rickshaws are operating in the city, with over 0.2 million families dependent on these for their bread and butter.
He said a few months ago this matter was raised by the authorities, referring to the Sindh High Court suo motu notice to ban noisy and smoke-emitting vehicles. A meeting was arranged with the governor and his attention was drawn towards the anomaly that on the one hand the government intended to ban two-stroke rickshaws, while on the other the transport department was issuing licences for operating these rickshaws, he added.
Shahi Syed said he was not against the implementation of the rules, provided they were enforced in their true spirit and were not used as “instruments of corruption.”
He recalled that in India two-stroke rickshaws were banned only after the government had provided owners compensation -- reportedly to the tune of 60 per cent -- which had greatly helped in meeting the price difference of switching over to CNG-fuelled rickshaws.
Moreover, it was not an easy task to change two-stroke rickshaws in such a large quantity overnight and the governor had agreed that all such rickshaws would be converted to four-stroke vehicles by 2010, he said.
Mr Syed claimed the governor had also agreed to take up the matter of providing compensation as the change from two-stroke to four-stroke would cost about Rs30,000, and as most of the rickshaws were owned by their drivers, they could not afford such a big amount.
The governor, he said, had promised to exempt engines from sales tax and other duties to facilitate them, but before such measures could be initiated, the city government had announced the ban, causing inconvenience to the people and hardships to the families of rickshaw drivers.
