KARACHI: Commuters especially students, workmen, teachers and elderly men are waiting in long queues at a bus stop commonly known as Matric Board Office bus stop in Karachi, with no end in sight as buses are fully loaded and few. Qingqi rickshaws are gone.
The Sindh High Court’s sudden decision to ban Qingqi rickshaws in Karachi city is has greatly added to the miseries of the people, particularly women, students and elderly persons, Jasarat learnt while talking to people in Nazimabad and Liaquatabad.
Sania, a student of Sir Syed Girls College says that “It is totally unintelligible that they banned the transport without providing an alternative, I used to come to my college through buses in the past but came Qingqi and six seater rickshaws and all the buses, those 4J, 4L vanished, now Qingqis are banned too, I have decided to skip college for a few weeks as a normal rickshaw takes 150 to 200 rupees for coming here”.
Working women and teachers too cited the same problem as they cannot even enter a bus which is fully loaded and even men are travelling in women compartment.
“Students can take leaves and stay at home, but what teachers will do?, I had to spent a thousand rupees in just 5 days to come to the university, who can afford that?”, asked an infuriated woman, a teacher at Jinnah University.
Qingqis provide a convenient and economical mode of transport, especially for shorter distances.
They run at a slow speed and are easily available.
Without an alternative public transport system, the withdrawal of Qingqis is going to accentuate the transport crisis in the metropolis.
” Perhaps our judges have no idea of the problems of the common man who can hardly make ends meet”, said an elderly man
The decision will create massive unemployment and loss of income for Qingqi drivers too.
“We are on roads, we have to feed our children, now our vehicle is with police and we have nowhere to go, we are unemployed”, said Ashfaq, a Qingqi driver.
One of the six seater rickshaw drivers said that “We know that they (the federal government) is bringing a bus project for Karachi, so we all shall be unemployed”.
“But what happened to the old Green Bus project, where are they”, said an angry citizen at the bus stop.
Karachi’s transport woes are unending and unnerving as the city has no government operated transport and the private owners have invested into Qingqi by selling their old buses.
With Qingqi gone, the miseries have doubled and the ban is falling heavy on the pockets of commuters and the poor families of the rickshaw drivers.
It is time government comes with a permanent solution.
