We are all aware that the taxi service in Goa is one of the worst in India. They openly scam tourists and locals too, the government has absolutely no control over the association. They don’t allow service providers like Uber, Ola, etc here, and at the end of the day it is citizens who have to suffer.
To start off, there are no taxi meters in Goa. You may notice a few taxis with meters installed, but no one uses them. The government does nothing to tackle this issue, and the taxi association clearly controls the local politicians, who don’t want to make any changes fearing a loss of votes. Anyway, lets not get into the political side of things, as that is another long story.
Below is a photograph of the latest taxi rates at the Dabolim Airport in Goa, which are completely wrong. Photo courtesy Travel and food tales, who keeps the page updated.
And here are the rates from the Goa Tourism website. Distances within Goa. Let’s consider a few examples. We shall compare the distances on the Taxi Rate Chart (image above), Goa Tourism Website (which does not have much info) & Google Maps (links below).
Dabolim to Margao
Taxi Rate Chart: 34 kms.
Goa Tourism Website: 29 kms.
Google Maps: 25.6 kms.
Dabolim to Calangute
Taxi Rate Chart: 45 kms.
Goa Tourism Website: No info.
Google Maps: 37.8 kms.
Dabolim to Arpora
Taxi Rate Chart: 50 kms.
Goa Tourism Website: No info.
Google Maps: 38.5 kms.
Dabolim to Agonda
Taxi Rate Chart: 74 kms.
Goa Tourism Website: No info.
Google Maps: 62.4 kms.
Dabolim to Ashwem
Taxi Rate Chart: 64 kms.
Goa Tourism Website: No info.
Google Maps: 52.3 kms.
Clearly, it does not take any rocket science to figure what’s going on here. And unfortunately a lot of tourists, who are not aware of the distances in Goa, fall for this. And on top of that, the government does not even bother to provide it’s citizens the basic provision of a proper bus service to and fro the airport, from major towns. This idea was brought up recently, but the taxi association put a lot of pressure on the politicians to stop it. This is the state of affairs in Goa right now, which we have to live with. No basic infrastructure.
Plus, the traffic management at the airport is a joke. I’ve addressed this issue before, but the authorities don’t seem to care. Taxis guys continue parking almost anywhere they want at the airport.
Anyway, I’m done with my rant. And I assume nothing will change.
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