The Darjeeling district administration has called a meeting with key stakeholders from the tourism and transport sectors of both the hills and the plains on Thursday to break the deadlock between drivers’ groups.

Representatives of tour operators, transporters, and drivers’ associations will attend the meeting virtually from two locations. The stakeholders from the plains will join the meeting from the subdivisional officer’s (SDO) office, while their counterparts from the hills will join the session from the district magistrate’s office in Darjeeling.

“We were verbally informed about Thursday’s meeting by an official of the state transport authority today (on Wednesday),” said Samrat Sanyal, the general secretary of the Himalayan Hospitality & Tourism Development Network (HHTDN). “The meeting will be held in virtual mode, with participants joining from both the plains and the hills.”

For the past two weeks, tensions have been simmering between drivers from the hills and those from the plains. Drivers from the plains have alleged that despite paying taxes and holding valid permits, they were prevented by a section of hill-based drivers from conducting local sightseeing trips in the Darjeeling hills. Some claimed they were threatened.

On Tuesday, drivers from the plains staged a sit-in demonstration in front of the SDO’s office, giving the administration a 24-hour ultimatum to resolve the issue. They warned that if no solution was reached, around 2,500 taxi operators would surrender their vehicle documents in protest.

Tour operators and drivers’ bodies described the decision to convene the meeting as a much-needed step toward resolving an issue that had been affecting the tourism industry for years. They noted that multiple appeals had been submitted earlier, and the ongoing protests finally prompted action.

Debasish Maitra, the chairman of the transport committee of the Eastern Himalaya Travel and Tour Operators Association, said: “We welcome the district administration’s initiative to resolve the stalemate. But we firmly maintain that our drivers must be allowed to operate according to the permits issued by the administration."