More grants, privatisation will improve bus services: KDMT chief

More grants from the civic body, privatisation and increase in bus fare are the only ways to improve the civic transport service, said Maruti Khodke, Kalyan Dombivli

More grants from the civic body, privatisation and increase in bus fare are the only ways to improve the civic transport service, said Maruti Khodke, Kalyan Dombivli Municipal Transport (KDMT) chief, on Wednesday, while presenting the draft budget for the year 2020-21.

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The draft budget, presented to KDMT committee members, showed ₹69.5 crore as income and ₹66.81 crore as expenditure for the year 2019-20. It also stated the estimated income at ₹91.35 crore and expenditure at ₹89.25 crore for 2020-21.

Last year, the KDMT chief had presented the draft budget of estimated income at ₹97.88 crore and expenditure at ₹93.58 crore for 2019-20.

“Last year, we had asked for a grant of ₹20 crore, which the civic body had given. This year, we have demanded ₹23 crore so that staff and worker wages are given on time. It will be difficult for KDMT to operate without the grant,”said Khodke.

Out of the ₹20 crore grant demanded, the civic body had given only ₹13.87 crore to KDMT for payment of wages.

The KDMT chief also emphasised on the importance of privatisation to improve services.

“Another way of improving the services is privatisation but there is no response from any agency. One of reason for no response is KDMT’s lack of good services. The poor service is due to the bad condition of the roads as well as frequent jams due to pending infrastructure projects,”added Khodke.

KDMT officials said that privatisation will ensure job security for 526 permanent workers (drivers, conductors and other staff) of KDMT and recruitment of more permanent staff members. It will also help in clearing all pending wages of the workers. The transport body has allotted ₹5 crore for payment of pending wages.

The civic transport body has been operating at a loss for almost a decade now, with few buses plying on the streets, lack of manpower, no maintenance of the buses and lack of infrastructure. Services have been adversely affected as the buses are not on time and they break down frequently.

The budget does not comprise any new proposals for 2020-21.

The civic transport body has 218 buses but only 65 to 70 ply on roads. In 2020-21, KDMT plans to add around 120 to 137 buses to the service after repairing them

This year, a budgetary allocation of ₹32.25 crore has also been made under the smart city scheme in which the KDMT plans to introduce transit management vehicle tracking and passenger information system.

The transport body chief also talked about the need to increase bus fares.

“The standing committee and general body of Kalyan Dombivli Municipal Corporation has approved the fare hike proposal and sent it to the state government for approval. We expect its approval in 2020,”added Khodke.

KDMT has planned to repair the buses as the private contractor appointed in March 2019 failed to do the job efficiently.

The transport body plans to repair 70 buses between January and March 2020.

For the financial year, the civic transport body has plans to build a workshop at Khambalpada depot in Dombivli and Vasant Valley depot in Kalyan, build a shed at Ganesh Ghat depot in Kalyan and repair its offices.

KDMT will also try to hire more drivers, conductors and workers for the workshops through private contractor to improve service.

In 2019-20, KDMT earned ₹16.46 crore while the estimated income is ₹30.4 crore for 2020-21.