A closer look at Kashmir’s e-rickshaw conundrum
There’s a new e- creature fluttering about on Kashmir’s streets. It’s not quite a car, not quite a scooter, but something in between: something lighter, louder, and unpredictably zippy. No official name exists, so I named it: Kaltoonch.
You’ll find them buzzing through narrow alleys, parked diagonally at traffic signals, or honking aggressively at pedestrians who are, quite frankly, walking faster than them. But as opposed to popular legend, Kaltoonchs are not necessarily slow-moving, can zip through the jam packed roads like squirrels on Red Bull, only to splutter on the next incline. It is not just a vehicle, it’s an experience. And like all phenomena in Kashmir, it’s as much comedy as it is crisis.
e- rickshaws AKA “Kaltoonchs” sprang up quicker than anything since the good old days of ISD, STD and PCO booths, when overnight, every other shop became a phone-booth calling centre. Or like that inexorable wave of white Tata Sumos back in the late ‘90s, which bred on the roads quicker than traffic police, could blink. Actually, their ascendance is only matched by how half the Valley - collectively opted to be engineers, doctors, or MBA graduates -why not all three at the same time?.
Now they rule our streets-and occasionally even the sidewalks. They blow their horns as if charging into battle, but drive as if they’ve already lost. They cut off the road, make hairpin turns, and stall with impunity. What began as a good-green environmental movement soon became a clattering enigma we can’t unravel.
As an engineer, I’ve heard it all — “The battery has a five-year life,” “It just needs to be charged once a day,” “Maintenance is pretty much nothing.”
Let me translate that into Kashmiri reality.
- a) Most low-cost models are driven by lead-acid batteries that begin to fail after 12 to 18 months -after having braved Kashmir’s potholes, jams, overloads, and periodic roadside re-charging with knotted extension cords.
- b) Five-year Li batteries, as technologically advanced as they may be, last barely 2.5 to 3 years under average usage. Battery life is greatly shortened when deep discharging and incorrect charging cycles are the norm - and they are.
And the kicker: there isn’t a government-approved battery recycling system. Dead batteries are dumped behind shed backyards, in landfills, or buried under sheds, quietly poisoning our groundwater and soil with toxic chemicals. We’ve chased gasoline vapors out of our atmosphere, to make room for toxic battery runoff to contaminate our land and groundwater-and no one’s paying attention.
Operating a Kaltoonch is an adrenaline ride… or a brain twister. They speed down lanes like rambunctious puppies one minute, and sputter in mid-slope the next. Sprints or stumbles, no middle ground. They come to a halt with a passing glance, honk with all their might like it’s their final honk ever, swerve around cows with the skill of stuntmen, and U-turn royalty only requires their approval to get by. They don’t follow routes-they establish them. Furthermore, they stop at whim, not at schedule. And yet, within the surreal universe of Srinagar traffic, they function, just.
The people behind the wheels are not street ninjas-they’re mostly college dropouts trying to build a life in a world that gave them the keys but stopped short of the map. Most borrowed funds. All were promised minimal maintenance and regular income.
Here’s the catch: although proudly mounted installed meters are handsome additions to dashboards, they’re all but forgotten—dashboard ornaments as functional as exercise bikes in unused living rooms. And riders? They pay more than government-established rates, even though the significantly lower per-km price of electricity makes it look like peanuts.
So, where do we go from here?
For all its chaos, the Kaltoonch isn’t the villain of the story- it’s just a character written into a poorly edited script. What it needs isn’t ridicule, but reform. And that begins with a serious look at how we treat its most important organ: “the battery”.
Let’s start there. Just like you can’t update your demographics on Aadhaar card without handing over your biometrics, no Kaltoonch should be allowed to get a new battery unless the old one is properly returned and recycled. Whether it’s a simple buy-back system or a deposit model, something must give. Or else, we’ll soon have a separate landfill dedicated to “dead but not buried” lithium.
But where would these old batteries go? Not under tarpaulin sheets in Batmaloo or behind any shop in Babdemb, surely. Instead, we need visibly marked disposal points-real, municipal-run collection bins, stationed where Kaltoonchs are born, live, and eventually retire: stands like Lal Chowk, Dalgate, Soura, Hazratbal and Gawkadal etc.
Of course, recycling infrastructure alone won’t fix everything. We need to plug the charging chaos too. A Kaltoonch driver shouldn’t have to trail extension wires through a third-floor window or beg a Pu’jj Waan (mutton shop) for socket access. What’s needed are safe, fast, public charging stations, where drivers can juice up without electrocuting someone’s hen coop in the process.
And the drivers themselves? Most have no formal training—just the courage to drive a humming triangle into a live traffic orchestra. This isn’t fair to them or to the people they carry. A simple two-day orientation program could make a world of difference. Nothing fancy-just a crash course on traffic norms, battery health, passenger etiquette, and how to take a U-turn without inspiring poetry.
Then there’s the overloading problem. The Kaltoonch is a tiny vessel, not a mini-bus. Three adults-four, during chilly winter mornings, if and only if one has a kangri and is sitting sideways-is a fair limit. It’s not just about comfort, but battery strain, safety, and dignity (of both rider and machine).
We, the passengers, must also shoulder our share of blame. We wave them down mid-road, expect door-to-door service for ₹10, and complain if they take a turn slower than a bullet. We must also learn to behave: board from proper stops, and stop asking to be dropped “thoda aage, woh red gate ke baad left.”
And finally-perhaps most crucially-it’s time for the government to get digital with Kaltoonchs the way KPDCL did with home electricity meters. Let’s connect these machines to a basic tracking system. If a Kaltoonch’s battery is about to die, let the RTO get a gentle ping. If a meter isn’t used for an entire week, let it trigger an alert. It sounds futuristic, but it’s actually pretty doable-and it could completely change the way this sector is regulated. And if we must gamify it to make it fun, so be it. A leaderboard of “Top 5 Kaltoonchs Who Actually Used Their Meter This Month” wouldn’t hurt anyone.
Kaltoonch is not a joke. It is a promise, of clean air, employment and connected communities. But without organization, backing, or sustainability, that promise will collapse in on itself. So laugh when you spot one making a U-turn through parked cars. Smile when one cuts lanes like a fighter pilot. And then ask, What happened to making this work better, for drivers, riders, and the Valley’s future? Because behind every Kaltoonch is a young Kashmiri working hard to make progress. Let’s not merely honk, let’s create a system worthy of their effort.
Mirza Mohammad Idrees ul Haq Beigh, is an engineer and an IP strategist.
