Bhubaneswar, April 21: Kiran Kumar Das, a 28-year-old autorickshaw driver, sustained serious injuries while another autorickshaw driver attacked him yesterday.

Khandagiri police have registered a case against the accused, who is a supervisor of Baramunda autorickshaw stand.

This is not the only instance of violence among the autorickshaw drivers of the city. On March 29, an autorickshaw driver, Kamal Sarkar, was killed by another at the CRP autorickshaw stand following a dispute over payment of membership fee of autorickshaw association. In that case too, the accused, Suresh Nath, was the supervisor of the local autorickshaw stand.

The victim, who had bought a new vehicle and joined the autorickshaw stand recently, drew the wrath of his killer as he could not pay the amount required for the association’s membership. There was tension between Sarkar and Nath. The situation took a violent turn on that fateful day when Sarkar slapped Nath, who was beating his brother following an argument. In retaliation, Nath stabbed Sarkar to death with a knife.

Nayapalli police later arrested Nath from Malipada village on the outskirts of the city. In another incident in February, two cases of dispute between groups of autorickshaw drivers at Acharya Vihar Square were registered in Shahid Nagar police station.

According to sources, there are more than 15,000 auto-rickshaws plying in the city. Their drivers are patronised by two different associations — Bhubaneswar Autorickshaw Mahasangha and Rajadhani Autorickshaw Mahasangha.

Members of the association admit that there have been disputes between autorickshaw drivers but these are sorted out. Most of the times, disputes arise over the associations’ membership fee and control of the autorickshaw stands.

“The local autorickshaw stands collect membership fee, though it is not permitted by the associations. But we do not take any decision on this, as this is their internal matter,” said Padman Samal, secretary of Bhubaneswar Autorickshaw Mahasangh, admitting that there were disputes between the drivers.

These autorickshaw drivers do not only get involved in disputes between themselves, but they have also been causing problems to the public by driving under the influence of liquor and demanding exorbitant fares.