“I had fever and diarrhoea and was asked to visit the clinic for a check-up,” said Kaushik. Here it was revealed that he was affected with a sexually transmitted disease.

Set up by a joint partnership between Apollo Tyres and Ambuja Cement, the health care centre at the Dhaulagarh depot is aimed to help truckers, among the high-risk category of people affected with HIV/AIDS.

“Most of the truckers spend days away from their family and often stop at small joints for quick sex, contracting sexually transmitted diseases,” said Sukanta Das, the counsellor at the centre.

The clinic, housed in two rooms, has a doctor’s chamber and a counselling centre. At a nominal fee of Rs 15, the truckers are provided treatment and medicines are given to them free of cost.

The clinic authorities are also holding talks with the West Bengal State AIDS Prevention and Control Society and city-based NGOs for expansion of the clinic to provide medicines for truckers afflicted with AIDS.

“It is not easy for truckers to discuss their sexual problems as talking about sex is considered a taboo in our society. Therefore we have approached people working at the grassroots level like cleaners of truck companies at the depot to persuade the truck drivers to talk about their sexual problem,” said Satasil Das, programme officer with Ambuja Cement.

With six transport operators working at the depot, nearly 20 “peer educators” are given basic training about sex diseases and imparted communication skills to bring truckers to the clinic.