‘Black flag week from Sept 9’
By Our Reporter
Shillong, Sep 6: The All Khasi Meghalaya Tourist Taxi Association (AKMTTA) on Friday slammed Tourism Minister Paul Lyngdoh for his false promises and at the same time resolved to hold a ‘black flag week’ from September 9 to 14.
The association has also appealed to all tourist taxi drivers to put a black flag on their vehicles during the protest.
The decision to hold the black flag week was taken during a meeting at Mawngap Lumparing community hall which was attended by members of the different units from various districts of Khasi and Jaintia Hills.
While speaking to reporters, AKMTTA president Rikal D Dohling said that the government has not attended to their request to ban vehicles from outside from ferrying passengers to tourist spots in Meghalaya.
“Till now, we have not received any communication from the government. It is sad since we had impressed upon the state government to address their concern since last year,” Dohling said.
The AKMTTA president slammed Tourism Minister Paul Lyngdoh who had assured to convene a joint meeting of the transport, tourism, and the police to discuss the issue within two weeks when they had met him in July.
“We now realise that the tourism minister knows to give false hope with his sweet words. But in reality, he is not concerned about our problems,” he said.
Meanwhile, he said that many of the tourist taxi owners are already planning to sell their vehicles since they are not able to pay the insurance and taxes.
‘Sadly, it has reached a situation where local tourist taxis are not getting any trip as Assam tourist taxis are ferrying to the various tourist spots,” the president said.
Stating that tourist taxis from outside Meghalaya can bring tourists and other passengers to the state, however, the right to ferry them to different tourist spots should belong to the local tourist taxis.
It may be mentioned that the association in the letter submitted to the tourism minister had stated that the destination for vehicles from outside ends in Shillong.
The association further mentioned that on any given day, there are at least 3,500 vehicles that bring tourists into the state, out of which over 2,400 are from outside.
It further stated that local tourist taxis are losing out due to the unregulated entry of tourist vehicles from outside.
Another major issue that the association highlighted is that whenever their vehicles take or pick up passengers to go to the airport they are fined by the traffic police for carrying excess passengers whereas vehicles from outside are not taken to task. ‘This act by the police is unacceptable’.