CITU union hits out at Transport Minister for blaming workers for bus breakdowns

CHENNAI: Hitting out at the Transport Minister SS Sivasankar for blaming the workers for the frequent bus breakdowns, CITU-affiliated Tamil Nadu Transport Corporation Workers Union accused the government of not filling up vacancies in the technical staff since 2013 and upward revision of bus age norms led to the drop in the bus services.

“When there are norms for how many workers should be there for a bus, who is responsible for not filling the vacancies that have arisen since 2013? The DMK government has not appointed a single technical worker in the last three and a half years. Who maintains the buses where technical workers have not been appointed for the last ten years?” the CITU union said in a statement.

The union also questioned who increased the lifespan of buses from six years to nine years and from nine lakh kilometres to 12 lakh km after the DMK government took charge.

It also pointed out that the DMK government got an additional two-year extension for buses that have completed fifteen years citing Corona.

The CITU-affiliated union alleged that there was corruption in the procurement of spare parts by the corporation officials. It wondered whether the minister was involved in it.

“It is not appropriate for the Transport Minister to speak in the Assembly hiding all these and blame the maintenance department officials and technical staff for the bus breakdown,” it said, adding that the biggest achievement of the DMK government was more workers affiliated to the union supporting the regime than previous AIADMK govt.