‘How will we pay for our expenses… ’: Many BluSmart drivers return home, stare at joblessness

Bothers Anmol and Puneet Singh Jaggi, promoters of BluSmart, stand accused of diverting Rs 262 crore – loaned by government-owned lending agencies to procure 1,700 electric cars – towards personal indulgences and related-party entities.

Kumar, hailing from Karnal in Haryana, lives at Gurgaon’s Sector 86 in a rented room with another driver. BluSmart’s parking hub in Sector 83 is nearby. Like most other BluSmart drivers, he used to earn between Rs 30,000 to Rs 40,000 per month.

Now, he plans to return to his village in Karnal. He and his roommate do not have enough money to pay the monthly rent of Rs 4,300.

Kumar, who has to spend around Rs 25,000 every month on rent and education of his two children, said: “We have to pay rent, school fees of our children and medical bills of parents, among so many other expenses. How will we pay for our expenses?”

Jagveer Nagar (37), another driver with the service, said some drivers who have come from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh have already returned home. “The rest are packing their bags and will leave anytime soon… Since BluSmart drivers don’t own their cars, we can’t even shift to another cab service like Uber and Ola,” he added. Unlike Uber and Ola drivers, who could drive their own or rented cars, BluSmart owned all the cars in its fleet.

Nagar, who had been working for BluSmart for more than two years, is now thinking of returning to his previous profession – working as a bouncer.

Every Wednesday, BluSmart used to pay its drivers their previous week’s earnings. According to the drivers, they were lucky that the company, before it shut its operations last Wednesday, released the previous week’s earnings. Only after that did the company send out a message to all drivers asking them to park the cars in their respective parking hubs for an audit. The company, however, still owes most of its drivers money they had earned last Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, they said.

BluSmart’s last intimation to the drivers was that they would be called back after the audit. While the drivers said they were told they would be informed on April 20 about resumption of operations, they haven’t heard anything yet.

The Gig Workers Association, forum of workers who work for e-commerce companies, has demanded that BluSmart should immediately disburse all pending payments, including earned income and the weekly incentive of Rs 8,000 owed to drivers. It has also called for compensation equivalent to three months of income to be paid to the drivers.