The sweltering heat of the Capital has taken its toll on DTC buses and its commuters. Almost 300-400 buses, mostly air-conditioned ones, breakdown on city roads everyday adding to the sufferings of daily commuters. However, several of these buses continue to ply on their usual routes with ineffective and a flawed air-conditioning system.
The Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) presently has a fleet of 5,200 buses, comprising of 2,506 Ashok leyland buses and 1,275 low floor buses manufactured by the TATA. The department had purchased these buses prior to the Commonwealth Games in 2010, promising comfortable rides, especially during the scorching heat in summers. “The AC units in majority of the buses are faulty. If you are traveling by the DTC’s AC buses you have to beg the driver to switch on the AC. The Government has spent crores for these AC buses but there is hardly any bus where the ACs work properly,,” said Yogendra Marwah, a corporate employee.
According to DTC officials, with the increasing breakdown of their buses in the city, maintenance cost has drastically gone up from Rs 60 lakh to Rs 65 lakh per day. Besides, almost 80 per cent of AC buses are reported to have cooling problems. “The maintenance cost of non-AC buses is between Rs 3.20 to Rs 6.50 per kilometer. For AC buses the cost for first 75,000 km is Rs 4.10 per km and for the next 1.5 lakh to 2.1 lakh kilometers is around Rs 7.10 per km,” said the DTC officials.
Records with the Delhi Traffic Police suggest that about 350 to 400 incidents of breakdowns of DTC buses are being reported daily. “We remove over 400 DTC vehicles from the roads on a daily basis. For this, we have got over 100 cranes to remove the dead vehicles to prevent traffic clogging,” said Anil Shukla, Joint Commissioner of Police (Traffic).
Contrary to the DTC, the Delhi Integrated Multi Modal Transit System ltd (DIMTS), which operates cluster buses (Orange buses), claims to have a better track of record when it comes to breakdown of buses. DIMTS officials claimed that the breakdown rate of cluster buses is within the ‘controllable’ range of 0.8 to 0.9 per cent of buses per 10,000 km. These buses run around 25 lakh km a day.
“We carry out preventive maintenance and ensure that there are no backlogs. We ensure that genuine parts are used and regular training of technicians and drivers for improved workmanship and driving skills is done. Additionally, we have a quality check system on maintenance in the depots,” said Smita John, spokesperson, DIMTS.
Three years down the line, the DIMTS is yet to roll out its fleet of 5,500 AC buses across its eight clusters. Out of the proposed number, it has only been able to introduce 1,140 AC buses in the Capital. “We are planning to add more buses to our fleets but the unavailability of specifications necessary for buses in the market is holding us back. Moreover, there is a scarcity of depots also. We are optimistic that AC buses would be rolled out very soon,” the official added.