Share autos eat into RTC revenue

Tirupati: As the name itself suggests Palle Velugu buses, now known as Telugu Velugu buses, were introduced to cater to the travel needs of rural passengers. But, the number of buses in the district were declining year after year and during last seven years there was a fall of 186 buses from all depots in the district.

Though RTC officials were maintaining that it was Chittoor district which runs most number of Telugu Velugu buses in the state. But, they were conveniently ignoring the fact that the number was falling every year. The main reason for the declining trend in number of buses was the reduction in occupancy ratio. Most of the village youth were relying on share auto rickshaws and their number has been increasing across the district.

Sensing the pulse of the villagers, these share autos or private vehicles reach the pick-up points just before RTC bus arrives there. The people, who were always in hurry, relying on those vehicles without any hesitation. RTC authorities argue that they could not run the buses without required occupancy ratio as they have to end up with huge loses.

There were 714 Telugu Velugu buses in the district operating from the 14 depots which have reached to 707 in the subsequent year, 629 in 2013-14, 615, 590, 586 in the next subsequent years to reach 528 in 2017. According to informed sources, only Piler Depot has increased the number of buses by 3 from 76 during last year.

RTC is incurring an expenditure of Rs 27 per kilometre but public transporter is not getting even Rs 10 in most of the areas. In some other areas, the RTC ending up with a net loss of Rs 15-16 on an average per kilometre. In several other cases, farmers were looking for these buses to take their produce to markets early in the morning.

Citing one reason or the other, several Telugu Velugu buses were stopped causing severe inconvenience to rural passengers. There were demands from many villages for a bus service connecting their place which RTC was not in a position to consider. “If RTC buses runs on time then we will prefer them only instead of private transport as they are safe and less expensive.

In case of uncertainty in the arrival and departure of these buses, we are forced to go in share autos”, said a passenger. RTC unions were demanding the government to bear the loss from running Telugu Velugu buses to save RTC.

By V Pradeep Kumar