Hardlook: DTC struggles, private players make hay, Grameen Sewa feels pinch
The AAP government issued a directive to owners to get their permits renewed for the next five years.
A DTC bus deployed to pass through Jharoda Kalan last month stayed on the route for a mere three weeks before it was pulled out. (Express Photo by Amit Mehra)
“Bas, bus karo, we joke,” says a senior DTC official. “It’s a lost cause,” he adds, before reeling off the tale of a cash-strapped enterprise struggling to serve a growing population.
“We have around 4,000 buses, while Delhi needs 6,000. We have concentrated on arterial routes and routes which have more commuters. The rural and semi-urban areas of Delhi have scattered population pockets, so fewer buses ply there,” he says.
Akshay Kumar, a tea stall owner in Outer Delhi’s Poot Khurd, says after a walk of around 2 km, waiting several minutes for a bus is normal. Residents of the remote village in Bawana are used to waiting. “Shahar mein zyada busein chalti hain (More buses run in the city),” he says, referring to the more developed parts of the capital.
It is not only the scattered population, but the nature of life and work in the semi-urban areas of Delhi which affect the distribution of buses. “The travel and commute of residents in the outer areas are unidirectional. People go to the urban or industrial areas of the city in the morning and return home in the evening. So the demand is high for a few hours twice a day. Empty buses trundle back and forth, bleeding money, the rest of the time,” says a transport department official. The solution, officials say, is smaller buses to swiftly ferry commuters in and out without waiting to fill up.
Delhi government has been planning to procure 500 midi buses for rural regions. Meanwhile, the standard floor DTC buses are being pulled off the roads because they are too old and unhealthy. Only about 500 of the 1000 are left on the streets. Truant drivers and skipping stands is a small part of the problem as well, says a depot manager.
And low-floor buses are ill-suited for rural roads. “They run best on well-laid roads in New Delhi area. When they drive in these rural regions, their floor hits bumps on the roads, damaging the engine set at the rear end of the bus. Breakdowns are common. And low-floor buses are too big for the narrow, crude roads in these regions,” says an official at the Bawana DTC depot.
To make life a little easy for the unidirectionally travelling population, the DTC has arranged 165 ‘Limited Trips’ to ferry a set number of people from certain villages to a common workplace and back.
In the absence of enough public buses and growing demand, private players sneak in and monopolise the market. In urban-rural areas of Delhi like Najafgarh, well-off families have bought fleets of buses and vans. These ply, both legally and illegally. “We have eight buses. We are doing well. No DTC buses come here, so we started our own transport. All are commercial, registered vehicles,” says Sandeep, the owner of this fleet of interstate carriages plying in Jharoda Kalan.
A DTC bus deployed to pass through Jharoda Kalan last month stayed on the route for a mere three weeks before it was pulled out. “What can we say? Local politics. The private players are rich people and linked with politicians. Their staff are so strongly entrenched in the village that locals board their buses, ignoring the DTC bus. We were incurring heavy loss,” says a DTC official.
Many middle class families like a 50-year-old Kailash’s have bought vans, which ply as commercial share taxis. “Azadpur is the main chowk. This fleet of 150 private vans ply without fear because they pay a hefty ‘entry’. We also pay ‘entry’ to traffic police to allow us to overload our vehicles,” says Vikas, a Gramin Sewa driver. “People choose vans over our Gramin Sewa because they are faster and smoother. They are not registered with the government and do not pay commercial vehicle tax. Their earnings are theirs to keep,” adds Vikas. The route of the Gramin Sewa services here is from Azadpur Chowk to Maidangarhi village.
Double (he says the name stuck due to his build) who owns a fleet of vans, says, “See, we are doing the janta a big sewa. There is a rush for vans in the morning from the village to the Metro and bus stands, and the other way in the evening on this 4-km stretch. There are only 55 Gramin Sewas. People get late, schoolchildren are left stranded. There is no alternative for them but us.”
Roughly 6,000 white Tata Magic vehicles under the Gramin Sewa scheme were introduced in 2010 by the Sheila Dikshit government to connect villages, JJ clusters and unauthorised colonies to main roads and Metro stations. Over the years, hundreds of complaints and traffic prosecutions for overloading, diverting routes, plying on undesignated roads or main roads and absence of proper permits have been registered.
The AAP government issued a directive to owners to get their permits renewed for the next five years. “Till date, 4,200 permits have been renewed. The rest of the vehicles might have been sold off, gone off the road, might be plying in Haryana or Uttar Pradesh. Those without permits should not be plying,” says a transport department official.
Many of these vehicles ply illegally on routes where there is more money. “There are four Gramin Sewas from Trans-Yamuna area plying on our route from Saket metro station to IGNOU. They repainted their route numbers… But no one says anything,” says Narendra Kumar, a Gramin Sewa owner and driver. “Fares per person have remained at a meagre Rs 5 or Rs 10 since the last five years. If we seat the stipulated six people, we will lose everything,” adds Kumar.
Dr Tanvi, a resident of Freedom Fighter Enclave near IGNOU, says, “We have no option. We do not mind this much because, at least, they are plying here even if it means sitting on a few inches of space.”
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