Thousands of lorries and trucks off road

Bangalore, Sep 21: More than 15,000 trucks and lorries went off the roads from Saturday, Sep 20 midnight, demanding legislation allowing sand mining and permits for trucks transporting sands.

Claiming that the agitation was throughout the State, the Federation of Karnataka State Lorry Owners and Agents' Association President G R Shanmugappa told UNI that following failure of talks with Transport Minister R Ashok, there was no option left but to go ahead with the strike.

The functioning of Railway Goods Shed was badly affected as trucks were not lifting the goods that had arrived, he added.

He alleged ''the main problem was that Bearucrats were not ready to budge and Ministers were dancing to officers tune.

despite our demand for a Legislation to transport sand to Bangalore to curb illegal transportation, the government was not willing as Officials cannot extract more bribe by harassing the lorry owners and drivers.'' He said during the meeting, in which besides the Minister, Transport Commissioner Bhaskar Rao, as nodal officer, and Revenue officials were also present.

''we proposed a royalty of Rs 3,000 per truck per month while the government was insisting on charging Rs 5,000. It has permitted only 300 truck-loads of sand a day to enter Bangalore while the City needs around 3,000 truckloads, he informed.

UNI