SS Sivakumar blames AIADMK regime for deteriorating quality of govt buses

CHENNAI: State Transport minister SS Sivasankar on Wednesday blamed the previous AIADMK regime for the deteriorating quality of the government buses and said that the present government has taken efforts to procure 4,000 buses in the next six to seven months to improve the quality of buses and the service.

"We have already procured 100 new buses and they were operated in different routes. In the next six to seven months, the government will procure 4,000 buses," said the minister while responding to the charges of Leader of Opposition Edappadi K Palaniswami that the DMK regime repeated the same on procurement of buses in the policy book of the transport department.

Pointing out the recent incident of a woman commuter slipping through the caved-in floorboard of the government bus in Chennai, Palaniswami said that the incident was evidence of the government buses. The present dispensation has increased the lifespan of the SETC buses from 7 lakh kms to 12 lakh kms, while the lifespan of mofussil buses have been increased from nine lakh to 12 lakh kms instead of procuring new buses to improve the service. In the AIADMK regime, 15,000 buses have been procured, Palaniswami said.

Rebuking the LOP and his charges, the transport minister said that it was the AIADMK regime to be blamed for the poor condition of the existing fleet of the government buses. It did not procure the adequate number of buses to maintain the quality of the fleet of the government buses.

The Covid pandemic induced lockdown and tender process delayed the procurement of buses after the DMK came to power, he said and noted that the state transport buses service would improve immensely in the next two years.