Of fares and auto acceptance

Growing up in Bengaluru, the usual mode of transport in the early 1990s up until the 2000s was the BMTC buses or the ubiquitous autorickshaws, simply called autos. I took autos everywhere, as they were so convenient. No waiting for buses or hassles of driving. You just hailed them, and if they agreed to take you to your destination—that was based on a series of factors like, would the auto driver get a ride back this way or towards his home, would you pay one-and-a-half times or double the fare if it was beyond a certain time in the evening—you could get a ride.

I mean, if you have grown up in the environment, you are part of the system and know how to navigate it.

Cut to the 2020s, and the auto situation gets worse each time I visit, especially after having lived in other cities for nearly a decade.

Autos in Bengaluru have gone high-tech; being in the IT city and all, I’ll give them that. Most are on booking apps, and you can book them for a fare slightly higher than normal. So now, if you try to hail one without using an app, they ask you for 1.5 times or double the fare while probably wondering what you are using your smartphone for.

They all accept digital payments, and it’s just fantastic, as earlier, getting back change once you paid the cash was no better than a myth. If you stood your ground and asked for it, you were looked at as if you were a lowly miser.

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Compare this with Kolkata, where they have a system of shared autos. They cover short distances and have about 3–4 stops, and the fares range from about Rs 6 to Rs 15. You hop on and hop off, which is a great way to run errands near your house. Since the fares are low, they have a bag of coins, and exact change is returned to you. Imagine my delight! And everything is quick, as the next passenger is already waiting to get in, and many of these stops would be at a traffic signal or a bus stop, so they had to make way.

But the best I have seen so far, beating other cities by leaps and bounds, is Mumbai. The auto drivers mostly don’t refuse a ride unless there is a very strong reason, like a huge traffic jam along the way. Many times, as I walk towards the auto stand and they sense that you are looking to take one, they immediately turn on the ignition and bring the auto in front of you, waiting for you to get in. By force of habit, I stop and ask, knowing fully well that I will not face rejection. It is like in the old Hindi movies. The hero just hails a
taxi, jumps right in, and THEN declares his destination.

I do that on some days, and it gives me such a sense of power!