THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: AITUC has asked KSRTC to scrap the wet lease agreement for Scania buses as it has been a drain on the corporation. AITUC-affiliated Kerala State Transport Employees' Union in a petition to the KSRTC MD Tomin J. Thachankary pointed out that the corporation had already acquired a loss of Rs 66 lakh for five months after the wet lease agreement. Union general secretary M.G. Rahul said it has become clear that the wet lease was not in the interest of the KSRTC.
"As per statistics, the buses were incurring an average monthly loss of Rs 13 lakh. The revenue from them was only Rs 46 per km, against the target of Rs 52 per km," he told DC. KSRTC went for the wet lease as part of the plan to reduce the employee-bus ration from 8.5 per bus to national average of 5.5 per bus as recommended by the Sushil Khanna committee, sources said.
However, corporation sources argued that even though wet lease caused losses, if the KSRTC operated on its own Scania buses loss would increase by Rs 11 per kilometre. It would also mean an increase in the number of accidents, frequent delays and cancellations as they did not have staff with expertise to run these buses.
