Chennai: It's almost three years since Madras high court pulled up the state transport department directing to ensure and enhance public safety.
“Public transport should be both convenient and safe. We direct the transport department to formulate a policy in a period of one month on all safety features, including the installation of manual or automatic doors,” the first bench of Madras high Court comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M Sathyanarayanan ruled on September 12, 2014.
Contrary to the court orders, buses remain unequipped with doors - the reason for around 1,100 foot board accidents in a year.
The bench was passing orders on a petition filed by conductor M Anburaj, secretary, Nethaji Transport Union.
“After the announcement, about 150 new buses have been introduced in Chennai and 200 in Coimbatore, 90 per cent of the new buses do not have doors. There are numerous instances when doors were either tied with rope or broken to accommodate more passengers,” said Anburaj adding that a bus with a closed door has a maximum capacity of 100-120 passengers, when it is open, it can squeeze in 40 more.
This resulted in numerous accidents including one on Friday when a schoolboy traveling in footboard of a crowded MTC bus was killed after he banged on a pillar at Vadapalani.
Following the burgeoning number of cases, RTOs were asked to deny a fitness certificate to buses with improper doors, however it was followed for not more than 15 days, MTC sources allege.
On a positive note, the rule was followed by inter-state buses and today, less than two per cent of the total buses commute without doors.
When contacted, an official from MTC said students are victims of most number of footboard accidents and they would sensitise the conductors on this. "It would cost crores to install doors in all the buses which is practically not possible, so all the new buses will be equipped with doors," he said.
