Truck them out

The nation-wide transport strike called by the All-India Motor Transport Congress AIMTC will certainly have a negative impact on normal li...

The nation-wide transport strike called by the All-India Motor Transport Congress AIMTC will certainly have a negative impact on normal life and the economy in the short term. Already, the prices of essential commodities have risen sharply in several parts of the country and manufacturers have begun to complain about the effect the strike is having on the flow of inputs and the clearance of finished goods. According to the AIMTC, some three million trucks are now off the roads and the impact of this can well be imagined given that surface transport has emerged as the lynchpin of the economy. Losses are estimated to run into several thousand crore everyday.

The pressure, therefore, on the government to capitulate to one of the nation8217;s best organised and strongest lobbies would be enormous. The pressure will be two-fold: not only will ordinary consumers, upset at the rising cost of items of everyday consumption, wish to see an end to the stand-off, the transport and trade lobbies 8212; long considered the BJP8217;s core constituency 8212; will use every trick in the book to get the politicians to give in. Already, large sections within the trading community have come out against the value-added tax regime and one of the important demands of the striking transporters is for the sector to be excluded from this new tax regime. So how should the NDA government deal with the crisis? It must not blink. Even a cursory glance at the demands raised by the strikers reveals the extremely retrogressive nature of this strike. With the exception of the demand to roll back diesel prices, which in any case the government has indicated it is willing to do, every other demand undermines attempts to regulate the sector and improve its general functioning.

For instance, the strikers want the measure aimed at controlling the overloading of vehicles to be rescinded. Not only does this measure ensure a modicum of safety since numerous road accidents have been caused by overloaded vehicles turning turtle, it helps spare roads from the wear and tear of such vehicles careening through them. The order banning 15-year-old vehicles in some regions has been introduce for environmental reasons, but it has a safety component too. As for the initiative to bring transporters within the VAT regime through an entry tax, such revenues would ultimately help the transport lobby since they would allow the government to build and maintain transportation infrastructure. By seeking cheap dodges instead of aiming to reform itself, the transport sector is doing itself a great disservice. Looking for immediate benefits is all-to-often the enemy of future growth and sustainability. It is for all these reasons that the striking truckers must be told they had better keep up or get trucked out.