Pune: Visually-impaired civic worker fined Rs 300 for travelling without ticket on PMPML bus

Another visually-impaired passenger, Narayan Desai, had a similar experience on Tuesday, when a bus conductor asked him to either produce the pass or buy a ticket.  “I told him that the PMPML was yet to issue me a pass. When I has gone to the PMPML office, they told me that the smart card that is to be used as a pass was not ready and I should come back another day. The conductor told me that he has been told by PMPML officials that even visually-impaired persons should be issued tickets if they don’t have a PMPML pass… the conductor told me, ‘next time, ensure that you have the pass, or you will have to pay for the ticket’,” said Desai.

Both Shitole and Desai work as ‘safai karmacharis’ with the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC). According to Desai, at the time of the incident, Shitole was wearing a khaki uniform that clearly indicated that he was a civic employee. “He was also carrying a PCMC identity card. If you are a civic employee, the pass is issued at a concessional rate. Yet they fined him….Is this is how you treat the visually-impaired in Pune,” he asked.

Describing the PMPML’s approach as “inhuman”, Jugal Rathi, convenor of PMP Pravasi Manch, said the visually-impaired and the differently-abled should never be asked for any sort of bus pass. “They should get a free ride… are we… so blind to their plight….,” Rathi said, adding that the PMPML should refund the entire fine amount to the commuter. Rathi claimed that complaints about the “high-handed behaviour of PMPML conductors, drivers and ticket-checkers” were increasing by the day.

“Recently, when I was travelling by a PMPML bus, the ticket-checkers caught a college student on board the bus. The student argued that the conductor had not reached him due to the heavy rush inside the bus. The student also said that technically, he could not be fined as he had not deboarded the bus. But the ticket-checkers forced him to shell out the fine amount, despite his pleas that he was a student and was not carrying enough cash,” he said.

Rathi pointed out that the transport body had hiked the pass rate for senior citizens and despite strong protests, it had refused to reduce the rate. “Commuters, especially senior citizens, students and the differently-abled, are being treated badly by PMPML…,” he said.

When contacted, PMPML spokesperson Subash Gaikwad said the transport body would look into the complaint. When asked whether the PMPML will refund the fine amount, Gaikwad said, “We will check the relevant rules and decide accordingly.”