End of the road for Bluelines

HC says permits of 'killer' buses will not be renewed after their expiry

Finally, the fate of Blueline buses in the national capital has been sealed. The Delhi High Court on Thursday said that the permits of 'killer' Blueline buses will not be renewed after their expiry. It has asked the government to implement the cluster bus scheme to ensure a hassle-free public transport system.



A division bench headed by Justice A K Sikri said that despite the expiry of permits of 1700u00a0 Blueline buses in recent times, the commuters have not faced any major difficulty. "The city's transport department and the public transport bus fleet under it were capable of handling the commuting needs of the people in the absence of Blueline buses. Other modes of transport systems including Metro, low-floor buses, gramin sewa vehicles and metro feeder service too were available for the commuters," the court said.

Rejecting the Blueline bus operators' plea seeking a stay on the Delhi government's decision to phase out the vehicles, the court said, "Blueline buses were allowed to ply after 2007 because their existence on road was justified as at that time their withdrawal would have caused inconvenience to public at large. 328 buses with valid permits are allowed to ply till June 2012, the deadline by which a few vehicles would be phased out every month," the court said.

In year 2006 there were 3,444 buses of Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) whose number has gone up to 6,337 in the year 2010. Ridership in DTC buses during this period has gone up by three times because of low floor big capacity buses introduced, the court said.

However, while issuing order in favour of Delhi government, the court said that now it is the obligation of the state to control and prevent accidents and make the traffic in Delhi better organised. It also asked the state government to introduce around 11,000 buses as per requirement of the public here.

During the course of hearing, amicus curiae and senior counsel Kailash Vasudev had suggested the drivers should be well-trained before they get into the service. "At a time not more than three buses should halt at a bus stop. He had also suggested that the Delhi Police should monitor the traffic in the manner they did during the Commonwealth Games last year."

Meanwhile the Delhi government welcomed the court's decision. Delhi Transport Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely said, "We whole-heartedly welcome the verdict. The court supported our position. DTC now has 6,500 buses including nearly 4,000 low-floor buses and the fleet will be able to meet the transport requirement of the city. We will also launch the cluster service soon which will provide lot of option to the commuters."

6,500
Number of DTC buses in the city

DTCu00a0strikes it rich
The Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) is striking rich, thanks to most of the Blueline buses being off the Capital's roads. On February 2, the DTC surpassed Delhi Metro in revenue collection. The Corporation registered a record revenue collection of Rs 3.3 crore in a single day. So far, average fare collection of DTC had been recorded at around Rs 2.5 crore while Delhi Metro's average cash collection is nearly Rs 2.75 crore.
A senior DTC official told MiD DAY it was the highest collection DTC has ever made on a single day.
The Corporation has a fleet of nearly 6,500 buses. "On Tuesday, 5,500 buses were sent out and in the evening schedule the number of buses was 4,500 buses," he said. " While it collected Rs 19 lakh from outsourcing buses to schools, Rs 2.87 crore was collected by ferrying passengers and Rs 21 lakh from concessional passes which DTC offers to diverse categories on Tuesday," the official added.
The officials said that in the past fifteen days, this was the third occasion when the Corporation collected over Rs 3 crore in a single day. "The major factor in the increase of revenue is that only 300 Bluelines are operating currently," said a transport department official.