Calcutta was meant to get cleaner air without compromising on transport but poor planning has ensured that there are no replacements yet for the 70,000 polluting autos and 6,300 taxis going off the road on Saturday.

According to official records, only around 1,900 green autos and 1,000 new taxis have been added to the city fleet since the high court set deadlines for the phase-out of two-stroke three-wheelers and commercial vehicles 15 years and older.

“How will we commute if autos and taxis disappear overnight in such huge numbers? Why haven’t the old vehicles been replaced with new ones?” asked Amrita Bhattacharya, a government employee on Friday.

There are no answers, only allegations.

“The PVD (public vehicles department) has been sitting on the applications of auto operators who have agreed to replace their two-stroke vehicles with new ones under the government scheme,” complained Sovandeb Chattopadhyay, the leader of the Trinamul Congress-backed Auto Bachao Committee.

He said PVD officials knowingly accepted “incomplete forms” instead of helping auto drivers complete the formalities properly and processing their applications quickly.

Chattopadhyay was mum on why the auto unions, including the one he leads, did not help their members fill up forms properly. He also dodged questions on why the unions staged roadblocks and created a law and order problem when the ban on two-stroke autos took effect on January 1.

The transport department accused auto and taxi owners of not showing any interest in availing themselves of the replacement scheme.

“We have so far received only 7,000 applications from auto operators and cleared 1,900 of them. The rest have been withheld for various faults, including lack of pollution clearance certificates and road permits, and incomplete forms,” a senior PVD official said.

Officials of Bajaj Auto Ltd, the country’s largest manufacturer of three-wheelers, blamed both the PVD and the auto unions for the delay.

“The PVD could have sped up the process but it didn’t, giving auto owners and unions a pretext to flout the ban. We can deliver green autos in large numbers any time if the PVD and the banks concerned clear the loan applications,” a representative of the company said.

More than 40 per cent of the autos plying in the Calcutta Metropolitan Area have no licence. As many as 90 per cent of the violators are two-stroke autos.

The high court had set January 1 as the deadline for the phase-out of two-stroke autos. These were to be replaced with four-stroke vehicles running on LPG.

But instead of implementing the ban, the state government bowed to pressure created by the auto unions through violence and argued in court for an extension of the deadline. The court relented and gave time till March 31, but the government bungled again.

The government’s request for a second extension — granted till July 31 — was based on the argument that more time was required to arrange for bank loans to replace old autos.

Officials of the nationalised banks chosen to finance new vehicles blamed the PVD for the delay in disbursement of loans.

The Lansdowne Market branches of Bank of Baroda and Union Bank of India — located within 1 km of the PVD office at Beltala — have yet to receive processed applications from the PVD.

“Our regional office has given the green signal but we need to receive letters of approval from the PVD to disburse loans. Not a single letter has reached us. Taxi owners have been coming to us but we cannot entertain their requests unless the PVD sends a list of persons eligible for loans,” G.C. Mistry, senior branch manager of Bank of Baroda, told Metro.

Auto driver Prasanta Das said he submitted a loan application in December but had to wait until May to buy a new three-wheeler. “My paperwork was complete; so why did the PVD take so long to process my application?” he asked.