But there are a couple of fallouts. One is that small vendors who did business when the trucks queued up aren’t getting the same response. “Some known drivers come and still take food from us. Others, it depends on the time of the day when they pass through this place. But certainly, business is down by half,” says R Muruganandam, a vendor near the closed Hosur checkpost. Drivers say that they find these wayside food vendors useful since eatables are cheap and they don’t need to undergo the agony of people staring at their stained clothes at restaurants.

Kumar has an interesting tale on some difficulties for the truck drivers post-GST. “Almost all our vehicles have General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) and the owners keep a tab on the truck movements. If they find the vehicle has stopped, then they call up the driver and question them why it has halted,” he says.

The GPRS monitoring and GST implementation are indirectly contributing to check the spread of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). “With GPRS tracking and no hold-up at checkposts, these drivers cannot visit commercial sex workers, who usually are found at these places,” says Kumar.

This is an encouraging development since India ranks third among nations with most number of HIV carriers.

The scenario with regard to truck movements on Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border is no different on the Karnataka side too with the Attibele checkpost totally deserted.