Metering the Autos!

State Legal Metrology Department has once again made an attempt at revisiting the fare list for the unaffordable autos in the state in a bid to regulate the arbitrary pricing by the auto rickshawwalas. The new stricture passed by the department in September requires the plying Auto Rickshaws to be equipped with new electronic meters and to bear the drivers' license details among other things. So it has taken the Government more than a decade to inflate its number of failed attempts at grappling the rickshaw-walas who charge exorbitant fares from the commuters without fear and immunity.
We all know that the Auto Rickshaws pliers do not push-down their meters for fare but charge commuters flat rates that too whatever they may ask. On asking for metered fare, one will get a standard response, ‘the meter is not working'. Sometime you get a shock after reaching a place when you see the meter shows double amount of actual meter-fare. One cannot win an argument with the Auto Rickshaw driver that his meter is malfunctioning or tempered.
The implementation and enforcement of the same could be really tricky keeping in view the hafta system and nexus between the auto driver union and the traffic officials. There is a bankruptcy of state owned transport for plying across the cities meaning lesser work for the department. Thus no explanation is possible behind lack of action against the auto rickshaw drivers when all that the department had to do was regulate private players. This very well points at department's zero accountability and negative approach towards this everlasting hegemony.
However, this much needed move if executed properly would bring respite to the tourists and local populace from the menace of auto rickshaw drivers.