Amid overloaded rooftop buses with commercial goods facing severe action of district administration and transport authorities from at least a fortnight by now, the bus owners have started appearing with comparatively relaxed muscles by now. One of the muscle flexing bus owners threatening of going on indefinite strike against so called inhumane action of authorities has said on Thursday that he was very much ready to abide by any amicable solution of the problem which carries some ‘humane’ touch with it.
“No bus owner is in support of overloading of luggage, especially commercial goods on the roof of buses and allowing it to travel for 400-500 Kms overloaded. No one wants to put the life of passengers on stake. But one needs to understand that if the luggage belongs to a passenger, we can’t refuse to take it to the destination. We have to run our business also, and administration is not going to help us if we refuse any passenger to get boarded in a bus with his belongings regardless the volume of it and his relatives force us to stop operation from very next day,” said Ranchi Bus Owners’ Association President Krishna Mohan Singh on Thursday. He added that a meeting regarding the issue was very much possible with district administration on Friday itself.
After repeated complaints from passengers about pathetic overloaded situation of buses going to and coming from dozens of destinations in Bihar, West Bengal, Odisha, Chhatisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and nearby destinations, the district administration finally started process of capturing and seizure of such buses from March 20 this year. Supported by district administration, a team led by District Transport Officer (DTO) Nagendra Paswan seized dozens of buses near Khelgaon Stadium on March 21 and allowed to move only after hefty penalty against overloading of rooftop and commercial (non-passenger) use of it. The drive is very much on since then, and district administration has asked the bus owners to drop the practice as soon as possible to avoid seizure.
“The action is very much on and we have been capturing such buses on daily basis. The wrong-doers will not be allowed anymore and bus owners will have to abide by the rules,” said SDO BS Yadav on Thursday. He also added that there was nothing called ‘humane’ angle in it and only humane thing was that bus owners needed to stop playing with the life of passengers. He said that the government was ready to tackle situations if bus owners appeared executing their plans of strike against such actions in near future.
Overloading of buses is not a new development in any of the buses going to and coming from destinations like Patna, Darbhanga, Samastipur, Madhubani, Saharsa, Buxor and others in Bihar, Kolkata, Burnpur, Asansol, Burdwan, New Jalpaiguri and others in West Bengal, Rourkela, Puri, Cuttack and others in Odisha and intrastate destinations. Many of the buses have met with accident only due to overloaded rooftop of buses, where commercial goods were loaded on it.
“We know that rooftop is not for commercial use and we don’t allow it, too. But we can’t keep tab on each and every of our bus and so we employ agents in bus stand. Sometimes they are forced to load commercial goods which they find difficult to protest, because they fear of the loss of their daily bread and butter. But we can also not force a passenger of not getting of some extra kg of baggage loaded, as it is our part of business. The administration needs to understand it and its difficult for us to compromise on that part,” said Jharkhand Pradesh Bus Owners’ Association President Satchidanand Singh.