Bengaluru: While announcing the waiving of Motor Vehicle Tax on BMTC buses last month, Chairman Nagaraj Yadav said that the money can be redirected to add more buses or to reduce fares.
But a month later, the ticket prices have not been reduced, nor has the corporation added more feeder services. “The waiving of the tax has brought down our losses, but not completely. We were suffering a loss of Rs 260 crore until the Motor Vehicle Tax of Rs 120 crore was relaxed. We have not broken even and cannot reduce fares at the moment,” said Managing Director Anjum Parvez.
After the 13 feeder routes were announced along with the Metro launch on June 17, no additions have been made. BMTC wrote to the Metro asking for Rs 18.1 crores to fund these buses, but there has been no response.
Member of the Bus Prayannikara Vedike, Mr Vinay Sreenivasa, has repeatedly said, “BMRCL never consulted BMTC about Metro routes and now they want BMTC to run feeders, even though it is causing losses to the department. Metro must fund feeders and they can easily afford it.”
However, Mr Parvez said, “Feeders are our responsibility and we will keep adding them. We will approach the state government for assistance."The Metro Purple Line has been up and running and Green Line joined around one-and-a-half months ago. Despite this, 12 Metro stations don't have feeder access on North-South corridor and eight on the East- West corridor.
“We introduced some feeders earlier on the Purple Line, like Trinity station,” a BMTC official said. “It did not see a good response, so we withdrew them. Now we are reassessing the need with a commuter survey ending on August 18 which will reveal where and when commuters want feeders,” he added.
Stations sans feeders on Purple line
Trinity
Magadi
City Railway
Central College
Vidhana Soudha
Cubbon Park
Halasuru
Hosahalli
Stations sans feeders on green line
Dasarahalli
Peenya Indl. Area
Peenya
Yeshwanthpur
Sandal Soap Factory
Mahalaxmi Layout
Rajajinagar
Kuvempu Road
Srirampura
Chickpete
K.R Market
Jayanagar
