The Hindu : New Delhi News : Operators on the warpath over new parking tax

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Sep 07, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Operators on the warpath over new parking tax

By Sandeep Joshi

NEW DELHI, SEPT. 6. Autorickshaw, taxi and bus operators in the Capital are on the warpath following implementation of new parking tax on their vehicles by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). Such is the confusion among operators over implementation of this new order that they are planning to launch an agitation against the move as well as to highlight their other problems including their alleged harassment by the Delhi Police.

Though the Municipal Commissioner has already announced the MCD Standing Committee's decision not to charge parking tax from autorickshaw owners, but an official communication in this regard has not been received by the Delhi Transport Department, the agency in charge of collecting the tax at the time of renewal or while issuing new permits. So, on Monday a large number of autorickshaw owners who reached the Transport Department's Burari office to get new permits were asked to pay the parking tax. But a large number of them refused to pay the new tax and kept their vehicles off the Capital roads.

It was on September 3 that the Transport Department received an official order from the MCD asking them to charge the new parking tax from all those coming to them for either renewal or to get new permits.

Under the new parking tax, an autorickshaw owner has to pay an additional Rs.1,000 while for taxi operators, it is an additional Rs.1,500; for tempos (small luggage carriers) Rs.2,500; and for buses and trucks Rs.4,000.

It was in this order that the MCD officials despite the Municipal Commissioner's directions failed to remove autorickshaw from the list of other vehicles on which the new tax has been imposed.

So, the Transport Department told autorickshaw drivers that they would continue charging them the new tax until they got a written order from the Corporation in this regard.

"The Government is cheating us. While on the one hand the Municipal Commissioner states that no parking tax will be charged from us, the Transport Department refuses to issue us new permits unless we pay the parking tax. It is we hapless autorickshaw owners who are always at the receiving end. But this time we are going to fight a decisive battle for our demands. We will go on an indefinite protest and hold traffic jams paralysing the entire public transport mechanism in the Capital," said Rajendra Soni, the general secretary of the Delhi Autorickshaw Sangh.

"Yet another Delhi Government decision giving the Delhi Police the power to seize defaulting commercial transport vehicles has badly hit our business. First we are forced to pay heavy challans and then even after paying the challans, it takes over 10 days to get our vehicles released. This is not only badly affecting our business but we also have to face mental harassment. Giving such sweeping powers to the police is totally unjustified and we will pressurize the government to withdraw such discriminatory order," Mr. Soni added.

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