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The association of bus operators on Sunday welcomed the West Bengal government draft notification, which stated that over-15-year-old stage carriers registered in the Kolkata Metropolitan Area will be allowed to ply with bi-annual fitness certificates. The state government presented the draft notification before the Calcutta High Court. The court held that there is no scope for further adjudication in a petition filed by a private bus owners' association, as their grievances were mitigated in the draft notification presented before it by the government. Disposing of the petition on Friday, Justice Rai Chattopadhyay gave liberty to the West Bengal government to publish the draft notification as submitted before the court at the earliest point in time. The draft notification said, "Stage carriage buses registered in Kolkata Metropolitan Area (KMA) only shall be allowed to ply beyond 15 years of age from the day of initial registration." Welcoming the order, the Secretary of Joint ...
Singing patriotic songs alongside DU students strumming guitars, Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta rode a 'U-Special' bus to her alma mater, Daulat Ram College, reminiscing about her college days. Gupta on Thursday re-launched the U-Special bus service for students of Delhi University as part of efforts to provide a student-friendly travel option. The service was launched with 25 electric buses, operating on as many routes, and will cover 67 DU colleges and other educational institutions. Boarding the U-Special bus from Delhi University Sports Complex to Daulat Ram College, Gupta shared a video on X in which she can be seen singing 'Ae Watan Watan Mere Aabad Rahe Tu' along with students playing guitars and conga. Captioning the video, Gupta wrote, "College, dosti aur guitar... laut aayi hai U-Special. (College, friendship, and guitar... U-Special has returned)." Delhi University Vice-Chancellor Yogesh Singh and Transport Minister Pankaj Singh were also present on the bus. At her a
The Maharashtra government has formed a 12-member task force to prepare an integrated bus transport plan for the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) with an aim to provide commuters with a seamless travel experience through a single-ticketing system. According to a government resolution (GR) issued by the Urban Development Department on Tuesday, the general manager of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) will head the task force, while the chief of the transport and traffic department of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) will serve as its secretary. Municipal commissioners of Thane, Navi Mumbai, Kalyan-Dombivli, Vasai-Virar, Mira-Bhayandar, Bhiwandi-Nizampur, Ulhasnagar and Panvel will be part of the panel, along with additional municipal commissioners from the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the MMRDA. The task force was formed following directives issued during a meeting of the Growth Hub Regulatory Board chaired by Chief ...
Bus services between Karnataka and Maharashtra have been suspended following the attack on the buses and the crew, a senior officer said on Tuesday. "We have suspended the bus services to Maharashtra since yesterday. The Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) too has stopped plying buses to Karnataka," a senior officer in the North West Karnataka Road Transport Corporation (NWKRTC) told PTI. In view of the tension prevailing in the border district of Belagavi over touchy issue, the decision was taken, he explained. Meanwhile, Narayana Gowda led Karnataka Rakshana Vedike (KRV) has given a call for 'Belagavi Chalo' on Tuesday. The KRV has decided to take out a march here in Belagavi, stage a protest and hold public meeting on Tuesday. The row over language started in Belagavi after a group of people allegedly intercepted the KSRTC bus and beat up its conductor and driver for not speaking to a passenger in Marathi. The passenger - a minor girl - too made a complaint sta
The State Transport Authority in Maharashtra will meet after a long hiatus of 30 months Thursday and may approve the MSRTC's proposal to hike the passenger fare by 14 to 15 per cent, officials said. The Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation had sought the hike in fare under an automatic fare revision formula (AFRF) to mitigate the daily loss of Rs 2 to 3 crore. This proposal was sent to STA for approval last year. Buses operated by MSRTC travel across the length and breadth of Maharashtra with over 55 lakh passengers travelling daily. The 15,000-bus fleet being operated by MSRTC is considered the largest in India. An official said on Wednesday that the STA, chaired by the state transport secretary, had approved a 17.17 per cent fare hike for MSRTC-operated buses under the AFRF in its last meeting in 2022, following which the existing fare structure came into force on October 26 that year. The STA is mandated to conduct at least two meetings in a year under section 60 of the
The contractual employees of a private operator hired by the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport undertaking went on a flash strike at one of the depots in Mumbai early Monday morning, partially affecting the BEST bus services. While BEST did not disclose the reason for the strike, sources said it was triggered by the alleged mistreatment of a pregnant woman conductor by officials of the private operator. A BEST official said the services were affected on a few routes as the strike was limited to the Pratiksha Nagar depot, while a union leader claimed more than 100 buses of the private operator remained off the road. Notably, BEST, which operates nearly 3,000 buses and serves more than 30 lakh passengers daily, has been without a general manager for more than a week. An additional commissioner of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is currently holding charge of the position. BEST public relations officer Sudas Sawant told PTI that employees of the wet lease operat
Tata Motors on Monday said it has received an order from the UP State Road Transport Corporation to supply 1,000 units of diesel bus chassis. The company received the order following a competitive e-bidding process, Tata Motors said in a statement. The bus chassis will be supplied in a phased manner as per mutually agreed terms, it added. "The Tata LPO 1618 bus chassis is engineered to deliver robust and reliable mobility with high uptime and low maintenance and operating costs. We look forward to commencing supplies as per the guidance of UPSRTC," Tata Motors Head Commercial Passenger Vehicle Business Anand S said. The latest order follows the successful fulfilment of a similar, larger order of 1,350 bus chassis received last year, which are currently running efficiently by the UPSRTC, the company said.
The strike by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) employees for salary hike and other demands entered the second day on Wednesday, which continued to cripple the services and cause inconvenience to lakhs of passengers, especially ahead of the Ganesh festival. The employees are demanding salary parity with state government employees, seeking a pay scale adjustment to match that of their counterparts in the state sector. An MSRTC spokesperson said that due to the strike called by the action committee of 11 trade unions, 63 of its total 251 bus depots, 63 were completely shut, 73 were partially shut and the remaining 115 were fully operational. Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has convened a meeting with MSRTC trade union leaders at the Sahyadri Guest House on Wednesday evening in a bid to resolve the issue. Due to the strike the passengers across the state are facing inconvenience. Besides the regular services, the operations of the MSRTC's extra Ganesh festival ...
Private bus operators of Rajasthan went on a one-day strike on Tuesday to press for their multiple demands, including increase in fare, simplification of the process for issuing temporary permits and tax waiver for buses unable to operate in rural areas due to rainfall, among others. There are nearly 30,000 private buses across the state which are not operating due to the strike today, Satyanarayan Sahu, president of the Bus Operators Association Rajasthan, said. These buses will not operate from 6 am to 8 pm on Tuesday, Sahu said. The bus operators are holding protests at various locations across the state, including Sindhi Camp here from where several private buses operate. "We have listed 24 points in our demand list, which were submitted to the Transport Department. There is resentment among the bus operators for not fulfilling the demands," Sahu said. He added that due to the strike, movement of about 40 lakh commuters is likely to be affected. After the demonstration, the b
Over 75 per cent of all intercity bus passengers, who made bookings on the redBus platform, travelled between 6pm and 12 midnight in 2023, according to a report. The time from noon to 5pm was a distant second with 13 per cent of all travel occurring during this time, the online bus ticketing platform said in a report released on Friday. A total of 76 per cent of people made intercity travel bookings on the platform for journeys between 6 pm and 12 midnight, the report said. As per the report, on an average, more than 50,000 buses were available on the redBus platform per day in 2023. All calculations are as per data on the redBus platform for 2023. Additionally, according to the report, the popularity of AC buses remained high, constituting 63 per cent of all intercity bus bookings on redBus, higher than the 60 per cent recorded in 2023. As per the report, Tirupati and Shirdi were the most-visited pilgrimage destinations in 2023, followed by Nashik & Ujjain (Mahakaleshwar). The .
The Delhi government is planning to launch a WhatsApp-based bus ticketing system in the national capital on the lines of the Delhi Metro, officials said. They said the Transport Department of the city government is working on rolling out the digital ticketing system for DTC and cluster buses. The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) already has a WhatsApp-based ticketing system in place. The service was launched in May this year and subsequently extended to all corridors of the rapid transit system, including the Gurugram Rapid Metro. There will be a cap on the number of tickets a user can generate. For purchasing Delhi Metro tickets, passengers have to send a message with the text Hi' to +91 9650855800 on WhatsApp or scan the provided QR code to effortlessly purchase metro tickets using their smartphones across the whole network. Ticket cancellations are not allowed in WhatsApp ticketing. A marginal convenience fee is applied to transactions made via credit or debit card, while no