IGI plagued by unruly taxi drivers and touts

Air passengers visiting the national capital have to deal with unruly taxi drivers and touts at the Delhi Airport. The touts approach them posing as drivers or travel agents, take them around the city, and end up fleecing them.

A source said that there are a number of such elements who lure foreign nationals under the pretext of offering cheap taxi fare. They not only misbehave with them, but also charge them extra. There have been a number of incidents in which app-based taxi drivers often cancel booking on their own, denying services at odd hours.

“I booked a taxi and received a confirmation message. The waiting time for this taxi was around five minutes. After getting a positive response from the cab driver, I immediately contacted him to confirm. Surprisingly, he denied service despite the confirmation. When asked why he had sent a confirmation earlier, he simply refused to talk on the issue and asked the team to hire another cab forcing me to cancel the booking,” said Ashok Sharma, a passenger at terminal 1-D on Monday.

On the same day, at around 3.45 am, a CISF personnel observed a man identified as Kaushal Singh Pal, a resident of Sangam Vihar, luring a foreign passenger at terminal 3 with cheap taxi fare. Since the passenger was in a hurry, he took the taxi and did not file any complaint, but the police intervened and filed a complaint against the taxi driver. Around 89 such cases were reported last year and 40 cases have been reported till June this year, said a Delhi police official.