As part of research for the rollout of the ‘mohalla’ bus service, Delhi Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot will be meeting MLAs of constituencies in Southeast and outer Delhi to understand issues of areas that are yet to avail the facility.
The ‘mohalla’ bus service, announced in the 2023-24 Delhi budget, aims to deploy shorter nine-metre electric buses to boost last mile connectivity in areas with roads that have less width or are crowded. “The transport minister will be meeting MLAs of different constituencies to understand the connectivity issues faced by people. He plans to hold these meetings with MLAs as well as the public also being present during that interaction. The appointments for the meetings are yet to be fixed,” said an official.
The official said that certain areas like outer Delhi, Sangam Vihar, Deoli, Chhatarpur, Vasant Kunj, Dwarka, Rohini, Najafgarh have been identified that are yet to have proper connectivity to bus stops and metro stations.
The meetings have been necessitated by the fact that the public feedback received from some areas lacked clarity and in order to ensure that the routes are chalked out properly, the minister will be holding these interactions, the official said.
“It is known that there are no connectivity issues or road infrastructure issues in posh areas. The areas that are unserved will be catered to under the service. The rollout of the service has been delayed due to the disengagement of 437 consultants and experts following the directions of Delhi LG V K Saxena. Around 50 such people working with the transport department were terminated thereby affecting many policies that were under the works,” another official added.
The Kejriwal Government has planned to procure more than 2,000 feeder buses to operate on routes that cannot be accessed by 12-metre buses. A technical committee was constituted by the transport minister in May to decide routes and operational characteristics of the new bus scheme.
According to a third official, the committee has completed the route survey based on the public feedback. “Now the survey data is being tallied with the population data of those, road infrastructure and width of roads,” he added.
