Crackdown on vehicles: School van drivers announce strike today

KARACHI: School van drivers in Karachi announced to go on a strike, once again on Thursday until acceptance of their demands, ARY News reported.

This is the second time that drivers, under the aegis of School and Colleges’ Vans’ Associations, resorted to strike. They first announced to keep their vehicles off the roads on Jan 10 due to government’s crackdown on vehicles using unsafe CNG cylinders. They had called off strike after assurance from authorities that seized cylinders would be returned.

On Thursday, the association said they won’t offer pick and drop services to children until their demands were accepted.

‘We want 1500 CNG cylinders back that were seized during the crackdown by the government,’ they claimed.

It may be noted here that the crackdown on school vans with CNG cylinders began on Jan 7 on the directives of Karachi Traffic Police Chief Javed Ali Mehar who expressed concern about the safety of school children after an incident in the first week of January where a school van in Orangi Town caught fire due to a short circuit. Mehar recalled that the Sindh transport department had already banned CNG and LPG cylinders in school vans and said that the recent crackdown was initiated to ensure the implementation of the ban.

Protesting the decision of IG Police, the van drivers marched from Lucky Star to Karachi Press Club where they held a protest against the crackdown and chanted slogans against relevant institutions.