| Tanker operators have also decided to join the strike from tomorrow, Mavjibhai Dodia, president, AGTTA, said. |
| Although essential goods like vegetables and fruits, petroleum products and milk are being ferried, retail prices of vegetables have shot up by between 20 and 25 per cent in the past two days. |
| Production work in industries has not been severely affected as most units have stocked up raw material. However, industrialists have begun to raise apprehensions that, if the strike continues, they will be forced to shut down their units. |
| "The industries have not had many problems as yet and they have arranged enough inventories to last for about a week or so. The transport within the industrial estate is moving smoothly. But the industries will be under pressure if the strike does not end soon," said B S Patel, president, Panoli Industrial Association. |
| Small units, which provide services within the industrial estates are also not affected as small transport vehicles within estates are not part of the strike. |
| "We have not observed any effect of the truckers' strike in the last two days. The internal transport system through rickshaws and other small transport vehicles is working smoothly. We will take the help of state transport buses to send our parcels. But, that is not a solution for the bigger industrial units," said Somuk Modi, proprietor of the V U Nagar based Modi Industries. |
| The machine tool and engineering industries of Rajkot, the soda industry of Porbandar and the cement and salt industries of Gandhidham will be badly affected, industry sources said. |
| There were no deliveries at Unjha spices market in Mehsana district. This is Asia's largest spices market. |
| Octroi collection in Ahmedabad has fallen by over 30 per cent in the past couple of days, with the AMC collecting around Rs 90 lakh per day instead of the average collection of about Rs 1.25 crore. |
| Exporters and importers are badly hit by the strike. "The containers destined for the overseas locations have been stuck up at the custom clearance houses and not likely to move till the strike ends. Moreover, stocks in the warehouses of exporters are not likely to move out due to unavailability of transport vehicles. The exporters and importers are likely to be hit badly due to the strike. The overseas buyers are not likely to buy the theory of truckers' strike," said Ketan Mehta, president, Exim Club, Vadodara. |
| "The price of missing the deadlines given by the client in foreign trade is too high due to international competition," he added. |
| Surat Textile Goods Transporters' Association president Yuvraj Desle accused the Centre of making misleading statements to weaken the strike. |
| "The government is saying that booking agents "" not transporters ""have been brought under the service tax net. Speaking in the real sense, any transporter is in a way a booking agent, which means that all transporters will have to pay service tax. We are already paying various taxes, and cannot afford to bear any additional financial burden that service tax will bring upon us," he said. |
| The Federation of Surat Textile Traders Association vice-president Devkishan Manghani, echoed Desle's opinion. |
| "Around 90,000 to a lakh textile parcels, containing goods worth Rs 80 crore to 100 crore, are sent from Surat each day. Transportation of these parcels has been stuck because of the strike, which is causing huge losses. We urge the Centre to resolve the dispute with the transporters at the earliest," Manghani said. |
| "Transport operators have shut down their books for further bookings of consignments. However, goods in transit will be delivered to the parties concerned," said Bharatsinh Rana, Joint Secretary, All Gujarat Transport Association. |
| "The transporters of other states who are working at present will also join us soon. The Karnataka transporters have not joined us immediately due to certain issues. But they are meeting on Monday to sort out the issues with other states' transport association members. Transporters of couple of states cannot remain immune to the call for strike. After all they will have pass through the states, which are under strike and they are also aware that the strike is for the common cause of the industry. Gujarat has observed complete strike in first two days and we are committed to continue it till our demands are not fulfilled by the central ministry," said Mavji Dodia, president, AGTTA. |
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