lack of coordination between city bus operators and municipal corporation staff, regular ruckus, undefined timing, ill-maintained bus stands with no display boards, lack of trained human-resources including heavy loss have resulted in bringing the city buses operations to a standstill.
Regardless of several attempts made in the past to rope in a few competent agencies for operation and maintenance (O&M) of city buses, none of the operators had turned up for running the city buses.
The Ranchi Municipal Corporation (RMC) had invited application from agencies, individual interested for operating city buses while taking care of all technical aspects in December 2017, however, not a single application was received by the civic body. A few clauses for city buses operation is said to be the prime cause for agencies, individual for keeping a distance from this tedious task.
With every passing day, the situation appears to be more dubious, when it comes to city buses service. As per the municipal corporation officers, RMC is planning to run the city buses on daily wage basis, for which expression of interest (EoI) has been floated for roping in eligible bus drivers and conductors. All the selected drivers will be given city buses to ply on four defined routes for a fixed hour.
However, as of now, none of the RMC personnel seems to be clear about the strategy to be adopted in the near future for flawless operation of city buses. “We have no other option left with us than to take the operation of the city buses in our hands.
Following the orders of Municipal Commissioner, Shantanu Agrahari, those drivers and bus conductors who will be roped in for the purpose, will take the city buses to run on the designated routes in morning and will handle the buses back to RMC in the evening. Rest all mandatory facets will be taken care by the RMC,” said, City Manager and In-Charge of RMC Transportation Cell, Saurav Kumar.
After terminating the contract of both the operators, Kishore Mantri and Suresh Singh in December 2017, Singh who had the responsibility of running 26 new buses purchased from TATA motors in January 2017 along with the old city buses has handed over 33 city buses to RMC recently. According to the City Manager, certain points are under consideration for easing the clause. Notably, two operators had earlier shown their interest for operating the city buses; however, a few clauses had proved to be a major hurdle.
Also, the municipal corporation is waiting for the operators to hand over all the city buses to them before plunging into any action.
“Only after taking the charge of all the city buses, we will be able to define our further strategy. More than 40 buses are yet to be handed over. Due to the poor condition of city buses, operators are finding it tough to bring the buses at Bakri Bazaar. Additional two days have been given to them,” added, Kumar.
Predominantly, the civic body which is engulfed in technical issues of buses since the beginning before taking the buses back will check the outer parts of buses like GPS devices, tubes and tyres, glasses, battery, self-system etc. As per the clause, the operators have to pay hefty fine for any default found out by the RMC.