Plains protest wheel jam

Vehicle owners and drivers’ associations in the plains have resented the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha’s movement to stall the opening of a “camp office” of the motor vehicles department here.

The vehicle owners in the plains had urged the district authorities to open a “camp office” here, as renewing licences or getting transport documents updated at the office of the Regional Transport Authority (RTA) in Darjeeling had become a problem ever since the Morcha’s non-cooperation movement from April 1.

Recently, the district administration had sought the state government’s permission in this regard. In protest, the All Hill Transport Joint Action Committee, a Morcha affiliate, has called for a two-hour-long chaka jam from 11am tomorrow.

“The Morcha is trying to trigger tension in the plains by resorting to such movements. They have stopped the RTA office in the hills from functioning and are now trying to stop the administration to open the camp office here,” said Ajoy Chakraborty, the president of the Citu-affiliated Darjeeling District Taxi and Private Car Drivers’ Association. “We condemn such steps to destabilise the transport movement in the region and want the authorities to take action against the Morcha and open the office.”

Bus owners of the region spoke on similar lines. “All our requests to the government, too, seem to have fallen to deaf ears,” said Pranab Mani, the secretary of the Siliguri Inter District Minibus Owners’ Association. “We are contemplating of resorting to a north Bengal-wide transport strike to press for our demand.”