The man who is the face of taxi in the city is off to Singapore to study cab services. $495,000 World Bank loan will make Mumbai taxis world class by 2020
The man who is the face of taxi in the city is going to Singapore to change the face of cabs. On Sunday, veteran taxi union leader A L Quadros left for Singapore with transport commissioner S B Shinde to study how cab services are operated there.
This is part of the World Bank's ongoing six-year old Cities Alliance programme, in which Mumbai has become the seventh city in India to get a grant of $495,000 to realise its dream of becoming a world class city by 2020.
In addition to plying Skoda cars as cabs on the city roads, the state was going to upgrade transport as well. It has already in principle agreed to Singapore-based Fulora foundation plans to overhaul the city cab transport system.
The idea is to create a GPRS run fleet management system that provides real time vehicle status, low cost service stations and an emergency response system.
“The new system will enable communication among cab drivers, allow them to record routes as well as go in for data retrieval for management analysis,'' Sanjay Ubale, OSD-Special Projects in the Chief Minister's Office and secretary in-charge of the Mumbai make-over plan, told DNA on Saturday.
The blueprint allows for cab services to be differentiated into mini cabs, medium-sized cabs and luxury cabs, with different rates. This transportation model is expected to increase the demand for call taxis and therefore, the cabbies' income. While the number of private cars in Mumbai has gone up from 61,000 in 1961 to 50 lakh in 2001, cab figures have remained static.
"Despite crowded trains and buses, cabbies have failed to tap the market. This is due to their inability to identify niche markets. Singapore had the same cab transport system that India now has. They changed and the drivers' income has seen a 20-fold jump," said Ubale.
The taxi unions don't find the idea to be practical.
Says a cynical Quadros, "In its bid to make Mumbai into another Shanghai, the state government seems to have forgotten that the city is full of potholes, hawkers and slum dwellers. It is impossible for any modern vehicle to ply on congested roads like Kalbadevi and Dongri.”
The bank recently signed a tripartite agreement with the Maharashtra government and the All India Institute of Local Self Government (AIILSG) to upgrade the city’s taxi system.
The capacity building programme involves the AIILSG holding consultations with experts, research and suggesting alternate solutions on issues identified in the core sectors of Housing, Governance, Infrastructure, Economic Growth and Strategic Planning for Mumbai in the Mckinsey report for improvement.
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