Pvt operators to own, ply 1,000 buses for MTC

CHENNAI: The Metropolitan Transport Corporation will add 1,000 buses under gross cost contract (GCC), under which private operators would own and operate the vehicles for which they would be paid on a per km basis. While officials said it would enhance the number of buses and improve efficiency, the workers have opposed the move.

As part of Chennai Sustainable Urban Services Programme (C-SUSP) that comes under the World Bank-funded Chennai City Partnership (CCC), the corporation is required to contract buses equivalent to a service capacity of 500 buses by 2023 on performance-based cost contract and another 500 buses by 2025.

“The GCC is a public-private partnership-based model. The responsibility of managing the transport network and revenue collection are undertaken by the State Transport Undertakings (STUs) while the responsibility of procuring, operating and maintaining the buses is by the operator. The STUs are responsible for the level of service quality to the commuters. The operator will be paid per km basis,” said a senior official from the Transport Department.

Service improvement and fleet augmentation are expected to result in enhanced volume, efficiency and quality of bus service, said the official, adding that the department has invited tender to appoint transaction advisor for the selection of a public bus service operator for this.

Sumana Narayanan, senior researcher, Citizen Consumer and Civic Action Group, said the increase in the number of buses operation would help the passengers in terms of increase in the number of services and efficiency. However, she added, it remains to be seen if the buses owned and operated by private operators would extended free travel to school students, women and differently-abled passengers

“The privately operated town buses in other cities in the State do not allow free travel of women or students,” she said.

K Arumugam Nainar, general secretary of CITU-affiliated Tamil Nadu State Transport Employees Federation, said that his union strongly opposed the move to deploy buses under contract model. “It is a move to privatise the STUs through the backdoor. We want the MTC to purchase the buses and operate through its crew to provide affordable travel for the passengers,” he said.

At present, MTC operates 3,436 buses on 625 routes and caters to more than 29.50 lakh passengers daily. It has a manpower of 20,301 employees who handle operations through 31 depots. Among India’s urban bus systems, MTC runs one of the highest effective km at 274 Km per bus per day.