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UPSRTC not keen on free rides for elderly women but gears up to deliver
The UP State Road Transport Corporation (UPSRTC) is not very keen on providing free rides to elderly women travellers because the move, it fears, will cause a heavy revenue loss with little possibility of the women’s welfare department reimbursing, people aware of the issue said
The UP State Road Transport Corporation (UPSRTC) is not very keen on providing free rides to elderly women travellers because the move, it fears, will cause a heavy revenue loss with little possibility of the women’s welfare department reimbursing, people aware of the issue said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), in its manifesto (Sankalp Patra) for the assembly polls-2022, promised free travel facility in public transport for women above 60 years of age, in what was seen as a counter to the Congress’s promise of a free ride to all women in government buses.
“Though as a government-owned corporation, the UPSRTC is gearing up to deliver on the promise made by the ruling party within next 100 days, at the same time, the authorities are worried that free rides to elderly women passengers may only worsen the financial health of the corporation,” an official said requesting anonymity.
According to a latest survey by the UPSRTC, around 12.50 lakh passengers travel in its buses every day with the number of women travellers above 60 having been estimated to be 0.85 lakh or 7% of the total passengers. The corporation feels that the freebie would entail an additional annual expenditure of more than ₹265 crore going by the fact that average ticket cost comes to ₹85 per passenger.
The corporation is believed to have already forwarded the proposal to the government saying that it will arrange providing free travel facility to women above 60 in the next 100 days but has smartly put a rider too.
“The UPSRTC will implement the freebie scheme soon after the department concerned (women’s welfare) agrees to compensate for the revenue loss in proportion to the free rides that elderly women avail and the government issues a GO to that effect,” the UPSRTC has said in its proposal to the government.
“The UPSRTC’s is a case of once bitten, twice shy,” the official pointed out adding “the UPSRTC has been providing free ride to lakhs of women on the occasion of Raksha Bandhan, every year, for the last several years, on the government’s directions and on the understanding that the government will reimburse the ticket cost to it but in vain.”
According to a recent presentation to the government, the UPSRTC transported 11.16 lakh women free of cost on Raksha Bandhan in 2017, 11.69 lakh women in 2018, 12.04 lakh women in 2019, 7.37 lakh women in 2020 and 9.26 lakh women in 2021. The gesture is said to have caused a revenue loss to the corporation to the tune of ₹8-10 crore every year.
Likewise, the UPSRTC is waiting for the revenue department to reimburse an amount of ₹350 crore for 35 lakh passengers it transported free of cost on the government’s directives during the Covid-19 lock down in 2020, while the home department too has not yet paid it ₹173 crore for the buses it hired to conduct panchayat elections last year. Dues of around ₹20 crore are pending against some other departments too.
“We do not mind providing free travel facility to elderly women in UPSRTC buses but we want the government to ensure reimbursement of the cost to the corporation to enable it meet necessary expenditures towards staff salary and fuel,” the official said.
