Report on sharing of assets submitted to Bhide panel: Official

Amid a deadlock on sharing of assets related to the Road Transport Corporation between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana following bifurcation, an official today said a detailed report has been submitted to a panel overseeing the matter.

The Sheila Bhide Committee is overseeing the division of assets.

"We have listed 14 assets as our share but the Telangana government says only three of them belong to us.

We have furnished a detailed report to the Sheila Bhide Committee and it is for the Committee to take a decision," Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC) managing director N V Surendra Babu told a press conference here.

Surendra Babu submitted a report to the Committee after a meeting with his Telangana counterpart, recently.

He said the APSRTC was able to reduce its operational losses significantly by Rs 301 crore in FY 2017-18 even as revenues touched Rs 5581.94 crore, marking a jump of Rs 331.51 crore over the previous year.

While RTC's losses stood at Rs 789.93 crore at the end of March 2017, they fell to Rs 488.66 crore by the end of March 2018, he said.

For the FY 2018-19, however, the projected loss was Rs 510 crore because of an enhancement in dearness allowance to its 53,000 employees, the MD said.

The constant hike in the price of diesel has been imposing a heavy burden on the distressed public transport operator as it was forced to foot an additional bill of Rs 210 crore this year alone, he said.

"Diesel price has gone up by at least Rs 7 per litre over the past few months because of which we are bearing an additional burden of Rs 210 crore.

We are, however, not increasing passenger fares as we are exploring other commercial options to increase our revenues," Surendra Babu said.

The RTC has been urging the state government to reduce cess on diesel to reduce the burden.

"We are paying Rs 4 per litre more as cess compared to Telangana and Rs 7 as compared to Karnataka.We will once again put forward our request for cess reduction," he said.

The MD said 850 new buses would be purchased this year at Rs 200 crore to launch operations in 134 new routes.

"We are also going to rationalise our operations to meet the peak traffic demand. There is also a proposal to introduce flexi-fare system for peak and non-peak day operations so that the occupancy rate can be improved," he added.