Goemkarponn desk
PONDA: Various taxi operators and All Goa Bus Owners Association General Secretary Sudeep Tamankar held a meeting at Ponda under the banner of Maruti Taxi Association Ponda Taluka.
Later addressing jointly to media, Sudeep Tamankar said the taxi operators had discussed the issue with Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on their two issues.
He further said Chief Minister is optimistic about finding a solution before Ganesh Festival.
Therefore, the Taxi Operators in Goa hopes for good news from the Chief Minister on their demand for scrapping the Goa Miles taxi app and introducing a Mobile App service for taxis instead of the mandatory digital fitment of meters.
Sudeep Tamankar said the tourism department has put the Goan taxi operators’ livelihood in trouble by illegally introducing the Goa Miles App in 2018 and authorized it in 2019. He said there are twenty illegalities while introducing the Goa miles app. He said the tourism department had floated tender to develop an App to welcome taxi service; however, they later hatched a conspiracy and started Goa miles Taxi business service. He said the Goa Miles is illegally introduced; hence, the taxi operators strongly opposed the Goa Miles, but the Government did not budge and refused to change its mind.
“As a last resort, we obtained information under RTI and filed a petition with Lokayukta. The Lokayukta took cognizance and heard our issue at least five times and issued notice to Government in the last month. The Lokayukta has suggested that the Government appoint a retired district or High Court judge and conduct an inquiry into the Goa Miles taxi app introduced by Government to give justice to taxi operators,” he said.
Tamankar said the matter was today before the Lokayukta; however, the government lawyer could not attend due to some reason. The matter will be heard before lokayukth on 25 September. We hope that its lawyer would follow the Court.
He said around 550 taxi operators have individually submitted 550 to Chief Minister Pramod Sawant’s office yesterday demanding to conduct an inquiry into Goa Miles app through retired High Court judge and hoping to get justice as suggested Lokayukth Goa.
The taxi operators filed 550 applications because our Chief Minister Pramod Sawant introduced the Bhumiputra bill in Assembly.
“He had addressed the media that he introduced the Buhmiputra bill when around 500 Canacona locals had met him and urged him to sort out their ownership issues of houses. We hope that similarly he would consider our demand and submitted more than five hundred applications yesterday, expecting that the Chief Minister would look into their matter,” he stated.
Similarly, the Taxi operators demanded a Mobile App service for taxis instead of the mandatory digital fitment of meters. Taxi operators opposed installing meters in taxis as it would damage airbags in Taxis, and even insurance companies warn against it.
“We have demanded with Government to permit us with Mobile-based taxi app instead of meters. In many states and cities, a similar mobile app is used to charge taxi fares. So we hope that Government will consider our both demands and before Ganesh Festival CM would give good news to taxi operators,” they said.
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