Commuters of the twin cities of Rawalpindi/Islamabad faced great hardship as public transport remained off the roads on Saturday owing to closure of CNG stations across the Potohar region as part of new gas load-management plan. The CNG filling stations across the Potohar region remained closed for third consecutive day in accordance with the new gas load-management plan of two and a half days.
This correspondent visited many bus stops in the twin cities to get the real picture and found that almost 90 percent public service vehicles including vans, mini buses, Suzukis and taxis were off the roads. People talking to Business Recorder said that the few transporters on the roads are fleecing commuters on the pretext that they are running their vehicles on petrol as gas was not available thereby justifying inflated fares. Other transporters are simply refusing to run vehicles claiming that they cannot afford to run them on petrol. In the absence of public transport, taxi drivers raised fares by four fold.
Due to unavailability of gas at CNG stations, public transporters do not ply their vehicles on the roads and those who operate do not complete their routes, however, the concerned authorities have become silent spectators, commuters at different bus stops told this correspondent. Due to lower number of public transport, long queues of commuters at different stops to reach their destinations were also observed.
The commuters complained that they faced a lot of problems as only a few public transport vehicles ply between their designated routes. People from all walks of life deplored the policies of the incumbent government and accused the government of failing to sort out the issues with the people facing crisis after crisis. Government has yet to take any concrete step or even present a comprehensive plan to resolve the problems of general public, they argued.