Observing the better living and working conditions of long haul drivers in the Persian Gulf between 2004-9, Founder Ramesh Kumar on his return to India began to explore the driving community at home. That’s when the reality hit him hard. Indian long hauliers are nothing short of orphans with no one owning any responsibilty towards them. Business enterprises, irrespective of their size, got into the “outsourcing” mode whereby they contracted out their transportation & logistics requirements to third parties. Thus, they felt they have no sense of belonging to transport community per se – fleet owner. Mostly, fleet owners opted to hire drivers on trip basis with no social securities (Provident Fund, ESI, Insurance against accident/death etc) benefits attached.
Drivers, by and large, hailing from under-privileged segments of society, grabbed whatever was offered with no proper documentation of their job profile and related security.
To get a clear grasp of ground reality, Founder Ramesh Kumar travelled 21,000 Km in long haul trucks across Indian highways between 2010 and 2012 through multiple trips. He captured these journeys through three books: 10,000 KM on Indian Highways (2011), Naked Banana! (2012) and An Affair With Indian Highways (2013).
Hyperlink:www.10000kmonindianhighways.com, www.nakedbanana.in and www.anaffairwithindianhighways.com
An Hindi edition of 10,000 KM on INdian Highways was also brought out in Hindi in 2012.
Realizing that writing alone would be insufficient to achieve transformation in the target group, he set up KRK Foundation, as a Registered Trust in National Capital Region (NCR) with his spouse Pushkala Ramesh and daughter Krutika Ramesh as Trustees on 27 February 2013.