SMC & police to take action against totos after Aug 15

Siliguri: The Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC) and Siliguri Metropolitan Police will jointly take action against the movement of e-rickshaws (toto) to ease the traffic congestion problem of the city.

They have already prepared a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) on the movement which they will announce after August 15.

Gautam Deb, Mayor of Siliguri, stated this during ‘Talk to Mayor’ on Saturday when a resident of Ward 38 raised the issue of toto movement on the highway.

“We are also irritated with these totos. The Commissioner of SMC and DCP Traffic have made an SOP. However, we cannot implement it now due to some reasons. This will be applicable in August,” Deb added.

The movement of totos is banned on highways. However, they are plying everywhere in the town, including the highways. There are about 5,000 totos that were given Temporary Identification Number (TIN) by the SMC. However, approximately 20,000 to 25,000 totos are operating in the city. Among these, some are registered totos from the Jalpaiguri district, while others operate without numbers.

Earlier too, the police administration took action against these totos several times. They even charged a fine but nothing worked and till now, totos are plying erratically. Besides, they are charging huge amounts from the passengers.

According to sources, no unregistered toto can ply in the city along with registered totos from other districts.

All totos, whether registered or unregistered, will not be allowed to ply on Hill Cart Road and Bidhan Road. Only registered totos can ply on the service roads of Burdwan Road and Sevoke Road. A survey on toto movement is ongoing.