Govt warned against failing to augur all its bus fleet as disabled friendly

The first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy, issued the warning based on a plea that the Tamil Nadu Government had issued a Government Order for procuring as many as 2213 buses with a mere allocation of 10 per cent being made access friendly buses contrary to a high court in 2016 categorically which held that all new buses to be procured by the State ought to be access friendly.

However, refusing to stay the government order, the Chief Justice said “It appeared that you (State) are in breach.”

“The authorities are reminded that the policy requires all new buses being procured to be disabled friendly and it will not suffice to only have a percentage of the number of buses to be acquired being disabled friendly,” the bench held.

It also noted “if the government proceeds with purchase of buses contrary to the directions and policies in this regard, then we have to undo that by directing the Government to come up with remedial measures.”

Appearing for the petitioner Vaishnavi Jayakumar, advocate A Yogeshwaran submitted that the high court had made it very clear in 2016 itself that buses plying in every route ought to be disabled friendly and that there cannot be select routes in which such buses are plied.

But contrary to this, the State continues to procure only a percentage of such disabled friendly buses, resulting in reduced mobility of the physically challenged.

The amicus in the case, advocate P Mohan submitted that despite several attempts to impress upon the State transport corporation authorities on the need for protecting the rights of the disabled and the court direction in this regard, the State since 2016 had procured over 4000 buses, with none of them being disabled friendly.