Converting to CNG costs Rs 2,5L, taxi drivers say; Supreme Court asks why they bought diesel cars at all
NEW DELHI: There has been chaos on Delhi’s streets this week as diesel cab drivers strongly protested the Supreme Court banning their taxis from plying in the NCR region after they missed their April 30 deadline to move to vehicles that run on CNG.
After two days of massive traffic snarls and protests veering dangerously close to violence, Delhi’s AAP government rushed to the top court yesterday asking it to review the ban that it said is inconveniencing the public and causing law and order problems. The court will hear the government’s plea on May 5.
The Supreme Court said on Saturday that it had given cab operators enough time to move to CNG that pollutes less than diesel or petrol. Drivers of diesel taxis say that converting to CNG will cost too much money and is unfair.
Estimates vary but reports put the number of diesel cabs at between 30,000 and 45,000. Many of them work for app-based taxi operators like Uber and Ola. It’s not just the cab drivers whom the court’s decision impacts.
An estimated 2 lakh commuters will be affected by so many taxis going off the road. Cab operators run large fleets of taxis that both corporates and individuals use to get their employees to offices in neighbouring Noida and Gurgaon.
Ban on diesel decided long ago, SC says
Still, the Supreme Court on Saturday said that in it was back in 1998 that it ordered that commercial passenger vehicles must run on CNG. Now, several deadlines and extensions later, hundreds of taxis have yet to convert to CNG.
“We cannot extend the deadline. You have to comply with our order. We extended many times and we cannot keep extending it,” the court said on Saturday.
Diesel cab owners and operator pleaded with the court that their livelihoods will be affected and thousands of drivers will be rendered jobless if they go off the roads.
One operator said he recently bought a diesel car with the help of a bank loan and was not in a position to invest money to convert the vehicle to one that runs on CNG.
“The livelihoods of tens of thousands of drivers who have taken a loan and bought a new diesel cab in the last 2 years is at stake with substantial EMIs (Equated Monthly Instalments) pending, “Ola, an app-based operator, also said in a statement it issued yesterday.
The court, anticipating such a response dealt with it on Saturday itself.
“You can argue endlessly and we are ready to hear you on some other day but we are very firm about our order. If your loan liability continues for next ten years, then it does not mean that we can allow you to ply your car on roads for the next ten years,” the court said.
No technology to convert to CNG, diesel cab drivers say
Cab drivers and operators continue to say there is no technology or certified conversion procedure to convert from diesel to CNG.
CNG kit providers told that only petrol cars can make the switch to CNG. There’s no way to retrofit CNG kits to diesel cars, they said.
“There’s only one way to convert a diesel car to CNG – change the engine,” said Om Prakash of Shas International, a CNG kit retrofitter in Gurgaon. Another CNG kit supplier, Lovato, said converting a diesel car into a CNG one requires installing a new engine that costs around Rs 2.5 lakh.
Ola, too, said that since there’s no technology to convert diesel to CNG, the salvage value of diesel cars their operators have are negligible. “With potential loan defaults, they stand the risk of not being eligible for any kind of loan, all their life,” the cab operator’s statement added.
Niranjan Raje, a member of the SC-appointed Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA) disagreed with Ola and many diesel cab operators.
Raje said that it is indeed possible to convert a diesel-run car to one that runs on CNG, but with one caveat. “A diesel vehicle can run on CNG, but the conversion cost is higher than that of petrol vehicles,” Raje said.
Cab owners aren’t ready to spend so much. They argue they have already paid more for diesel vehicles (over petrol ones).
“I’m a Gurgaon-based independent cab driver. I don’t think I can spend so much on retrofitting a CNG engine. Also, there are just a few CNG pumps in the city. How can authorities pass the burden on to poor drivers, when even the infrastructure doesn’t exist?” cab driver Ravi Kumar told.
This argument, too, the court anticipated when it delivered its order on Saturday. Citing its 1998 order again, the court asked why people bought diesel cars to ply commercially.
Delhi govt, Ola, Uber request a slow phasing out
Private cab operators like Ola and Uber said that they’ve been talking to the relevant authorities to facilitate a structured phase-out rather than what they call a sudden ban.
The AAP government in Delhi is also in favour of a slow phasing out of diesel cabs.
“We are fully committed to tackling pollution in the capital but a crisis has arisen,” the state government told the court during a special hearing yesterday. It said it’s in favour of the implementation of the ban on diesel cabs, but in a phased manner.
The court then asked the AAP government to present a roadmap for phasing out non-CNG cabs. “We will listen to your plea if you have a roadmap,” a bench of Chief Justice TS Thakur and Justice FMI Kalifulla said. The bench said it would examine the plea and the roadmap yesterday at 4 pm.
The AAP government, like the cab operators, seemed to be unaware of the April 30 deadline, so they couldn’t come up with a plan in two hours yesterday. It sought two days to make a plan ready. Advocate Chirag Shroff told the bench that deliberations were on between the government and stakeholders.
Making the CNG switch
In the meanwhile, Ola and Uber have declared they will help their driver partners make the switch.
Ola officials said they will hold a camp for their drivers, and help them exchange their diesel cars for CNG ones. Ola has 26,000 CNG cars in NCR.
Uber did not disclose the numbers of diesel or CNG cars it has.
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