Suhail Bhat
SRINAGAR, Apr 24: As public transport continues to remain off the roads due to the ongoing lockdown to prevent the spread of deadly COVID-19, families of many drivers are running out of stock and they are worried that it would be hard for them to make it through the lockdown with their meager savings.
The families said that before the imposition of the lockdown they had stored some essentials and medicines, but now with lockdown extended they have grown extremely despondent about the way things are going.
Altaf Ahmad, who is a driver profession, is worried about his family as their stock of essentials would last for less than a week. “We are extremely worried about our families. Our stock is about to end, what will we do? Some of my friends have nothing left in their homes. I want the government to an extended helping hand,” he said.
He is the sole bread earner of his family and much of his earnings get consumed in the treatment of his ailing mother. “Both her kidneys are damaged and she is on dialysis. All my savings are also about to end and I have no idea what to do thereafter,” he said.
What makes his situation worse is back-to-back lockdowns which Kashmir has witnessed in the last eight months. “We (drivers) were the worst sufferers of lockdown which Kashmir witnessed after the abrogation of Article 370 as all our all savings exhausted in that period,” he said.
The transport sector has been particularly dented hard by the two back-back lockdowns as the uncertainty forced the public transport off the roads. There are nearly 1.15 lacks vehicles and 35,000 maxi cabs including passenger carriers, mini-buses in Kashmir. Besides, there are 14,500 auto rickshaws of which 12,000 are in Srinagar district alone.
Nadeem Ahmad, a passenger cab driver, said their family normally keeps a stock of one month and it is about to end. “We normally keep our stock for one-month or so. We have run out of stock. Only God knows how we run our families,” he said.
In the past shutdowns that Kashmir witnessed over the years, many transporters would switch to various other jobs to sustain even under lockdown, but Coronavirus outbreak has confined them to their homes and raised concern about to make up for this drop in earnings.
Fayaz Ahmad Bhat from Tarbal area of Nawa kadal, told Excelsior that during the last shutdown he worked as a laborer to earn money for his family. “Earlier we would use to do different jobs to run our families, but the pandemic has trapped us inside our home and we are unable to work,” he said. He added that he recently suffered a stroke, but because of the lack of money he has stopped taking medicine.
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