State may clamp ESMA against private bus owners

The Orissa government may clamp the provisions of the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) to tackle the strike started by the Private Bus Owners’ Association (PBOA) from today.

The private bus owners are protesting against the collection of toll on the National Highways in the state. While the discussion is going on with the private bus owners to resolve the issue, it is keeping all options open, official sources said.

About 500 private buses plying in the Bhanjnagar-Baripada and Paradeep-Chandikhole route on the NH 5 and NH 5A have started the strike in protest against the collection of toll by National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).

“The discussion with the private bus operators are going on and we hope to resolve the issue soon”, said Sanjeev Sahoo, the state transport and commerce minister.

On the other hand, the private bus owners have given an ultimatum of two days to the government to resolve the issue failing which they threatened to launch a statewide strike. Meanwhile, the passengers in these routes were subjected to a lot of hardship due to the strike by the private buses.

Sources said, the toll fee collected at the toll gates are decided by the Union government and the structure of fees is same everywhere. If the bus owners incur loss, they can give a proposal for raising the fare which will be considered by the State Level Technical Committee (STC).

Meanwhile, the normal traffic on the NH-5 experienced serious congestion today as large number of vehicles stood on the road near Manguli. The vehicular movement was affected due to toll collection at Manguli, where road is congested. NHAI is collecting toll at the rate of Rs 40 (one-way) and Rs 60 (two ways) for cars, Rs 70 (one-way) and Rs 110 (two-ways) for light commercial vehicles. Similarly the charges for trucks are Rs 145 and Rs 215 and for heavier vehicles Rs 310 and Rs 465 for one-way and two-way passages respectively.

In view of the prevailing situation the transport secretary P K Jena has asked the Additional Transport Commissioner (ATC) to give a detailed report on the ground situation.