Move to rein in e-rickshaws in Lucknow in doldrums

LUCKNOW: The Lucknow police’s ambitious plan to regulate haphazard plying of the ubiquitous e-rickshaws, one of the cheapest modes of transport in the city, seems to have come to a nought.

To note, on January 1 this year, the Lucknow police introduced a plan to regularise e-rickshaws by defining their routes through registration and subsequent colour coding. But even after two months, the move is in limbo, as a very small number of vehicles has been registered.

The e-rickshaws do provide last-mile connectivity and make commute easy, but their mushrooming numbers clutter roads and cause traffic nuisance.

According to RTO data, over 50,000 e-rickshaws ply in the state capital. Against this burgeoning number, the number of those registering for colour coding is much less . Joint commissioner of police, law and order, Lucknow Upendra Kumar Agarwal said, “As per recent data, a total of 18,000 e-rickshaws have so far been registered.”

The move was initiated by the JCP himself to streamline traffic.

For the unversed, Lucknow police’s colour coding scheme entails e-rickshaw drivers to register themselves by filling a form with police verification, selection of routes and QR codes etc. .

Out of the 60,000 forms printed, 39,400 forms were distributed among the applicants. February 7 was marked as the deadline after which police also booked over 1000 e-rickshaws without any registration. Regarding police action, the registration is still slow with only 18,000 till March 7.

On the small turnout, JCP opined that the huge gap could be due to a number of reasons, like many vehicles running in other districts now. “Some vehicles may have been outdated now and may not be plying at all. Some which were registered in Lucknow may be now running out of the city limits,” he said , adding that the data of 50,000 number of e-rickshaw in the city was from a few years back.

Lack of authority with departments

“The move is yielding no results, with swarming e-rickshaws in the city. The registration of new e-rickshaws should be halted as their number is increasing every day,” said Pankaj Dixit, chairman of Lucknow Auto Rickshaw Three-Wheeler Association (LARTS).

Dixit also presented a letter to divisional commissioner Roshan Jacob about the proposal to halt the new registration of e-rickshaws in the city. “Cities like Agra, Mathura, Dehradun and Rishikesh have stopped new registration of e-rickshaws. This should be implemented here as well, ” said the letter , adding that those 11 routes which were banned for e-rickshaw in the city were openly being used by them in front of policemen.

However, the authorities concerned said that the power to stop further registration of e-rickshaw was not in their hands but with the government .

“Police can’t stop new registrations as the law of registration needs to be amended to do so,” said the JCP, adding that multiple letters to stop further registration had been written by him .

Expressing similar views, Md Alam, regional transport officer (enforcement) said, “We have received no directives to stop further registration. Such a directive has to come from the state level transport officials.”

Routes to be finalised in March

“Now we’re ready to roll out the move as in my opinion most of the e-rickshaws in the city have stickers on them barring a few. The routes will now be decided by the end of March ,” informed the JCP. He stressed that no e-rickshaw would be able to move in the city without registration.