Haryana Transport Minister Mool Chand Sharma on Friday launched  Kilometer Scheme bus service based on Vehicle Tracking System and flagged off five buses at Gurugram.

“The State Government is committed to provide proper transport facilities to the people of the State and  the arrival of these buses will certainly provide great convenience  to the passengers,” Sharma said, adding that under the kilometer scheme, 150 buses will be run soon in the first phase. In addition, AC buses and Volvo buses will also be operated through the Transport Department  under the kilometer scheme in due course.

The Transport Minister said the State Government has also planned to buy new buses for Haryana Roadways and approval for purchasing 150 minibuses and about 20 Volvo buses, 100 ordinary buses have been given and all these buses are likely to be added to the fleet before March 31, 2020. He informed that Gurugram will soon get a new bus stand, which will be equipped with State-of-the-art facilities and the site for this have already been identified.

Sharma said according to an estimate, about 8 to 10 thousand buses are required in the State. “This scheme has been introduced to fill this gap,” he said. Buses running under the Kilometer scheme are available at a rate of only Rs 26.92 per kilometer and this will provide better transport facilities to the public.

Additional Chief Secretary, Transport Department Siddhi Nath Roy  said out of these five buses which have been flagged off, two buses will  run between Gurugram to Chandigarh, two buses from Gurugram and  Jaipur and one bus from Gurugram to Hisar. He said in view of the high number of passengers on these routes, these buses have been started and soon such buses will be run on other routes as well.

Roy said these buses will be operated through Haryana Roadways and the conductor of the bus will be from the department. Along with diesel and maintenance, all the expenses will be borne by the bus owners.