AMEET OBEROI
SILIGURI, 15 Feb: Following an announcement by the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha general secretary Roshan Giri in Gangtok on Sunday, it was clear to all that vehicular traffic to and from Sikkim will not be disrupted by the indefinite bandh underway in the Darjeeling hills.
Till Sunday, only SNT vehicles were making the journey to and from Siliguri, and while this was a relief, even with 25 buses pressed into service, it was not adequate. Starting Monday, however, the jeep services were back in business, and in what has become routine now, a section of the operators were leveraging the bandh uncertainty to fleese commuters, demanding and pocketing as much as Rs. 500 per seat [against the prescribed rate of Rs. 140].
The rush at the SNT counter remained heavy yesterday as well, with people trusting this service more than the opportunism of jeep drivers at play outside. But as mentioned, there are only so many buses. By 1 p.m., SNT had sold out all seats on buses headed for Gangtok, Namchi and Jorethang and its ticket counter was closed. People were even willing to take the journey standing.
The ticket counter for jeeps was conveniently shuttered throughout yesterday [a common ploy to make people fork out more for tickets], but jeeps arrived and offered to run the risk of taking the journey provided passengers paid a premium. This is an old con and there is no danger to traffic on the highway anymore. But passengers have no way of knowing this in Siliguri and while some drivers were considerate enough to charge Rs. 200 per person [which no passenger protested], while this correspondent was standing there, two jeeps coursed by demanding Rs. 400 per seat.
Earlier, on Sunday afternoon, plainclothes West Bengal cops had detained a jeep when they found out that the driver had raised Rs. 500 per passenger for the Siliguri-Gangtok journey. The driver, perhaps tipped off on the police presence, abandoned the vehicle and the passengers at the stand and went missing.
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