Tax sops likely for less polluting cars: Subhas

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The West Bengal transport department is looking into the possibility of reducing tax burden for vehicles abiding by the polution standards. "We will give tax sops to less polluting vehicles," state transport minister Subhas Chakraborty said here on Friday.

"Demand for vehicles will go up in future, so will the pollution level in Kolkata," he said.

Moreover, the state government has extended the scheduled date for opening tenders for the proposed 50-kilometre six-lane elevated road by a month. "This is aimed at attracting more foreign companies," a top government official said. Tenders for the project were scheduled to be opened on July 31.

"Seven foreign companies have shown interest in the project," Chakraborty said.

"It will be in addition to the six-lane roads having a total length of 120 km in the city," Chakraborty said at a programme to inaugurate the radio cab service in Kolkata.

The city will soon have a fleet of 100 new airconditioned radio taxis catering to the premium segment passengers. The cabs, christened 'Kolkata Cab', will charge Rs 15 per km as against regular cabs' Rs 11-12.

Kolkata Cab, fitted with the option of credit card payment, will reach at the doorstep within 15 minutes, once the full fleet starts functioning.

The airconditioned taxi service in Kolkata was started with Blue Arrow to be followed by a similar initiative by Hindustan Motors. The state transport department had issued 300 permits to Hindustan Motors to roll out such cabs last year.

Neeraj Kumar, managing director and chief executive officer of ORIX Auto Infrastructure Services Ltd, a joint venture between IL&FS and ORIX Corp of Japan, said: "We will roll out fleets of 100 cabs in Hyderabad, Mumbai and Bangalore soon."