The city’s truck and taxi drivers are putting their lives at risk by going out to earn a living in the midst of a lockdown. Their families worry about their safety, but they have no option.
Manohar S. (67) has been driving a yellow-black cab in Thane, where he lives, for 45 years, but has never seen anything like the current lockdown. He doesn’t have the choice of staying home through it either; he is the only earning member in a family of eight. His son was to start working this month, but that has been stalled due to the lockdown. Mr. Manohar says, “It scares me but I cannot afford to be home.”
Rohit Mahesh (29), a truck driver from Chandivali, sets out for work every day, like he used to before the lockdown. “I have a mask and hand sanitiser, but my family worries every time I step out,” he says. The police have stopped Mr. Mahesh several times, telling him him to stay at home and that the virus spares no one.
But he has a family of 10 to look after, including two ageing parents who need medicines worth ₹750 every month. He also has to pay his EMIs for the truck he recently purchased. His 23-year-old brother, a construction worker, is out of work, leaving the responsibility of running the home to him.
Moin Abbas (34) lives in Mumbra and drives a small truck carrying essential services to the city. Three of his delivery boys have returned to their respective villages, and he now has to work overtime. “I used to work 10 hours a day, now I work 15 to 16 hours. My wife is worried when I am out. I have no option but to work,” he says. “I am grateful I get my salary but if this continues, I will fall ill with all the extra load. There is no one else to take care of my family.”
In the midst of fear and desperation, these drivers are also sharing the little they possess with the needy. Mr. Manohar, for instance, realised how the underprivileged were pushed to the wall, when he had to get his father admitted for piles surgery at Sion hospital the day after the nationwide lockdown was announced.
“I could easily take him there because I drive a taxi. But I worry about people who are poor and dependent on public transport,” he says. To ease their pain, he ferries people to and from public hospitals such as Rajawadi, Sion and Somaiya. Mr. Manohar says, “I don’t charge them by the meter, but tell them to pay me whatever they can.”
Taxi driver Lalan Singh (43) from Kurla stands outside grocery stores to help the underprivileged get to their destinations. Mr. Singh has given his number to shopkeepers in his area to inform him if someone needs a taxi to go home. It is not as if he can afford to do this: he has parents and children to look after. “If this kalapaani sazaa (banishment) continues, I will have to face a lot of financial problems,” he says.
But there is something within him that propels him to keep going, and to think of others. “I hardly make ₹200 to ₹300 a day, but it is at least better than not earning anything at all,” he says.
