Auto rickshaws play a vital role in addressing the last mile connectivity, in cities of Kerala especially with narrow roads. In a city like Kochi, the augmentation of public transport system was possible only by integrating the auto rickshaws in the system. There existed fragmented operation of Autorickshaws in Kochi city, acts as a hindrance to catch up with the modern concepts due to the inherent drawbacks in the traditional system. Accessibility to transport mode is the most important attribute that commuters need. Poorly designed public transport fail to provide access to the people, which in-turn cause to raise in private vehicles, resulting congestion, accidents and GHG emissions.
With the objective of the State Government in integrating auto- rickshaws for seamless mobility and to provide affordable last mile connectivity for sustainable development, thought for forming a Society of auto rickshaw drivers Kochi being a metro city, it was mandated through KMRL to have an integration of entire Public Transport system in Kochi including the Intermediate Public Transport (IPT) system with provision for affordable last mile connectivity. However, the existing scenario on auto rickshaw service was not feasible to provide the integration in terms of fare, physical and technical. The auto rickshaws in Kochi was under the leadership of various political affiliations of auto drivers’ unions such as CITU, INTUC, AITUC, BMS, STU, TUCI etc. While conducting a study with a CUSAT intern, it was found to understand that there was a control on auto rickshaw drivers of political trade unions, such as CITU, INTUC, AITUC, BMS, STU and TUCI.
Hence, it was decided to aggregate the fragmented auto rickshaws into a single unit by forming a society under the societies Act with the following vision.