There comes a stage in every MBA students life where after being subjected to hundreds of business case studies and generating business ideas after ideas for course after course ... We end up trying to identify whatever we find wrong in the world around us and try to come up with some innovative ways to improve it. Only to come to realisation that many solutions do sound nice or look good on paper and thts about it .. as far as practicality is concerned. But in one way or other these things do make us realise how or rather why the system operates in its present form. That in a way is a great learning by itself for future, if at all we get to changing things in future !
While discussing several of these ideas , lack of effective public transport in India is something we have debated about passionately. We did discuss one day wide range of solutions right from metro to car pooling and all ... While discussing about this i was drawn back to my days as a techie in Bangalore when I observed how people overcame this lack of adequate transport problem easily ( even if on wrong side of law)
I used to visit my hometown every alternate weekend and would reach Bangalore early morning arnd 5am when the public buses wouldn't be available and I used to get down on the outskirts of the city at a place just about 2 KM from my house .. since it was early morning walking all the way was ruled out , the only other mode of transport was Autorickshaw ... here it was the case of monopoly and at times the demand would exceed the supply and hence they would charge exhorbitant rates for their service
After a few months i noticed a few people would disembark from the bus and would turn down the waiting autos and would walk further ahead and wait near the bus shelter . I figured there must be some other alternate method of commute and joined them. Then they arrived , the 'call centre' cabs ... these cabs come after dropping off people to offices/homes or from wherever ... essentially they were coming back on return trips and for a very nominal amount would drop you to your place provided its on their way. The driver makes a quick buck and we , the poor commuters , were no longer held hostage by the auto rickshaw wallas ...
In Bangalore , there are huge numbers of private buses, vans , cars used to ferry the estimated 2 lakh IT/BPO employees in the city. Now all many of these vehicles put in multiple trips and hence go empty half of the time.
I used to wonder why cant Govt legalize these people picking up passengers on their return trip , we talk about energy crisis and the fact that oil imports are hitting us hard n all ... we also talk about how to optimize our energy needs , so if private vehicles were allowed to pick up passengers for nominal charges then aren't we saving energy and benefiting the common men as well . We would not only provide support for the public transport , which inspite of our best efforts is lacking in many places , but also effectively make use of already deployed vehicles in addition to saving on fuel , cutting down on pollution as well reducing the overall costs for all parties concerned !
Also if Auto drivers are allowed to take multiple passengers with per person/km fares , then multiple people can share costs and probably the driver might get more revenue and more fuel can be saved.
So can this be done , is it worth the trouble ?
I'm still not sure about the answer .. there are many many angles to this debate , but essence of my argument is that we are wasting a lot in the current process and do need a rethink sooner or later ... But this being the age of Private Public Partnerships , why not ?
