MARGAO: Four extensions and date changes later, the government seems to have no teeth in implementing a 2015 amendment in the Goa Motor Vehicles Rules, 1991 making it compulsory for all cabs in the State of Goa to be fitted with a fare meter of digital type with printer and Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking device.
The Rule 140 in the amendment was published in the Official Gazette Series I No. 36 dated December 4, 2015 and was to come into force from the date of publication. The date was later postponed to April 1, 2016, then to September 1, 2016 and finally to November 1, 2016, which is today. But the government with Ramkrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar as Transport minister has been weak before the taxi mafia and helpless in the face of the exorbitant rate fare controlled by the taxi unions who fleece of tourists continues in Goa.
All this despite a Chinese diplomat Bin Tao who visited Goa on September 30 in the buildup to the BRICS summit to check arrangements was harassed by the taxi operators which was resolved at Zuri White Sands, Varca only after the police intervened on behalf of Leisure Holidays.
Travel and Tourism Association of Goa President Savio Messias, who’s also a consultant to the 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup as one of the venues said even a senior FIFA official was not spared. (see box)
“The implementation of the amendment to the Rules, which is in the interest of the tourism industry, has already been unnecessarily delayed by 11 months. The tourist season for the year 2016-17 has already commenced with the arrival of large number of tourists. TTAG has decided to move court to resolve this issue and stop the image of Goa from being marred any further,” explained Messias. Messias added that when they confronted Dhavalikar on the matter, he was quick to add that there was nothing to worry as another extension will be published in another Gazette soon. We then confronted him on the entire taxi mafia and how the government seems to have no will to resolve these issues?
“See, here we have to follow the course of the law. All these complainants are foreign nationals and they disappear after their holiday and don’t appear as witness or complainant or don’t follow up on these cases, how you expect us to resolve the case then? I blame the tourist not the taxi drivers,” explained Dhavalikar.
Dhavlikar cited a vague incident by asserting that when RTO challans tourists with no helmets on rented bikes, the tourists exercise their right to pay later and they return the bike and flee the State and the fine is never paid since the rented bike owner holds no onus for the offence. Similar, he feels, is the taxi mafia issue wherein there is no complain or complainant and hence can’t be resolved. On the multiple delay of forcing taxis to fit meters he agrees there is no political will of his government to resolve the issue and passes the buck on the tourism department.
Similarly South Goa Collector Swapnil Naik, who was once Tourism Director, asserted that the onus is on the RTO and the Tourism Department to crack down on the taxi mafia and hence he has little or no say. “In fact I have no plan of action or no directive from my government to do anything about it and hence I will not jump the gun on the taxi menace,” Naik said.
Relich Noronha, a frequent Goan flyer who always feels fleeced by the taxi operators at the airport commends the effort of the newspaper to take up the issue but says that the government has no political will and feels pressured by the taxi drivers vote bank and hence is unwilling to crackdown on Goa’s famous taxi mafia.
