Mechanics from paramilitary may be roped in to tackle DTC bus breakdown

According to sources, the Ministry of Home Affairs has suggested to the Delhi government and the Traffic Police that they may take the help of the Motor and Transport unit of the paramilitary forces to tackle broken-down buses of the public transporter.

The DTC and the Traffic Police may request for 50 such skilled mechanics from paramilitary forces – such as the Border Security Force, the Central Industrial Security Force and the Central Reserve Police Force, among others – to assist DTC teams in repairing and removing of such buses from the roads, sources added.

During his first meeting with the CM and senior officials after the BJP came to power in Delhi, Shah had directed that to prevent traffic jams caused by broken-down buses, DTC should deploy quick response teams and coordinate with other departments to “seek immediate help and reduce the response time in removing the obstruction to the traffic”.

“Due to the size of these buses, they cannot be towed very easily. The cranes take time to reach them due to the traffic jam caused by its breakdown,” a senior official said.

The officer said that the Traffic Police has identified some major areas — Mehrauli to Gurugram at MG Road, IIT flyover to Modi Mill flyover at Outer Ring Road, Rao Tula Ram Marg, Sardar Patel Marg, Peeragarhi Chowk to Tikri Border at Rohtak Road and Punjabi Bagh to Naraina Flyover at Ring Road, among others — where the issue of congestion due to breakdown of buses is rampant.

According to the Transport department, the repair or removal of the broken-down buses from the roads sometimes takes over 45 minutes to one hour.  On Thursday, in a meeting, the Traffic Police requested the Transport Department to deploy its cranes and teams on important stretches to reduce the time taken to remove broken-down buses.

As of now, the department has 15 teams available to repair DTC and cluster buses.  The CAG’s audit report, sources said, analysed data of 2,661 broken-down buses vis-a-vis response time taken to remove the same from roads for the period 2014-2021.

“It was observed that there were 3.57 lakh instances of breakdown of buses on roads or 139 instances of breakdown of buses on daily average basis. In 70% or 2.51 lakh of these, it took more than 30 minutes to remove the buses,” a source said, quoting the report.

“…out the 2.51 lakh cases, the response time ranged between 31 minutes and two hours in 54% cases, more than two hours up to four hours in 29% cases and more than four hours in 17% cases,” the source added.

In the case of cluster buses — operated on a 50-50 profit-loss sharing basis between private operators and the Delhi government — between April 2015 and March 2017, the response time to remove broken-down buses was beyond 30 minutes in 71% cases.