\u201cThese were not deaths from assaults on the jobs, they were heart attacks or long-standing illnesses,\u201d Bhairavi Desai, executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, told The City Reporter. \u201cIt seems to us that the drivers did not have enough time to really take care of themselves and it really speaks to how grueling the hours are and that they\u2019re not able to take any time off for themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
Singh\u2019s widow, Sarbjit Kaur, wailed in grief as she and her 10-year-old twin sons laid flowers at a makeshift memorial Seventh Avenue and Charles Street, near where the 52-year-old cabbie was found late Friday by friends who tracked his vehicle to its last drop-off location.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/091526_taxi_worker_memorial-2.jpg\")
A friend of Jagjit Singh consoles the driver\u2019s twin 10-year-old sons at a West Village memorial, Sept. 15, 2026. Credit: Ben Fractenberg\/The City Reporter<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody could reach him for several hours and his friends went to the broker to ask that the broker look up where the car was, and that\u2019s when we found out the car had been here,\u201d Desai said, referring to brokers who handle medallion business. \u201cThe friends came here and found that our brother had died in the taxi.\u201d<\/p>\n
Singh, an immigrant from India, had been a licensed Taxi & Limousine Commission driver since 2007, according to the agency, though Desai said he also occasionally worked in construction. In 2023, Desai said he bought his own medallion.<\/p>\n
\u201c[He] worked 20 years just for making sure the kids have good education, the kids have a house to live and the wife and everybody else can live in this country a dignified and respectable life,\u201d said family friend Erum Hanif, chief executive of APNA Community Services in Brooklyn. \u201cThat was his sole purpose and that\u2019s why he was dedicating 18 or 12 or 15 hours every day and serving everybody else.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paramjod Singh described his friend as a devoted father.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a great person,\u201d Singh said. \u201cHe served this country.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Taxi](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/091526_taxi_village_memorial-5.jpg\")
Jagjit Singh apparently suffered a fatal heart attack after dropping off a fare in the West Village, Sept. 15, 2026. Credit: Ben Fractenberg\/The City Reporter<\/p>\n
Desai said all three of the recent deaths point to the toll that working in what she described as a \u201cgrueling, highly stressful job\u201d can take on the 180,000 drivers licensed by TLC. She said Singh is the apparent victim of a heart attack.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn most professions, you stress out over office politics or promotions or grueling work schedules,\u201d she said. \u201cFor drivers, you combine all that with dangers on the job and that you begin every day at a negative paying out of pocket.\u201d<\/p>\n
Desai recalled how NYTWA held health screenings for more than 10,000 drivers over the course of a decade, adding that \u201cat every health fair, we always had to call the ambulance.\u201d<\/p>\n
She added that Singh\u2019s death and those of fellow cabbies Khalifa Siwa<\/a>, 53, in August and 73-year-old Richard Coulibaly<\/a> in July will spur calls for changes to work policy and the long shifts for drivers.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can change these conditions so people can live fuller lives,\u201d Desai said. \u201cWe\u2019d like to see nurses\u2019 stations at the airports, at the airport lots or at other larger relief stands, where they can check in on their health, they can get guidance, they can get support.\u201d<\/p>\n Midori Valdivia, TLC commissioner and chair, consoled Singh\u2019s widow and children after saying she was \u201cin awe\u201d of his life. She also pledged to \u201cstand in solidarity\u201d with drivers.<\/p>\n \u201cThe incredible driver community is what brings me to work every day, but there is much more to do,\u201d Valdivia said. \u201cI do think that the mayor talks about an affordability crisis and a different part of the way the affordability crisis is how it impacts our drivers every day.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The on-duty death last weekend of the third taxi driver in as many months highlights the physical and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":347973,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,56,63,65,64,5260],"class_list":["post-347972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-taxis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}