Bengaluru: Though Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) officials have claimed that the condition of the buses running on city roads has improved over one year, due to changes in maintenance norms and driver's training, the commuters, however, complain they still get inconvenienced by breakdowns.
The BMTC operates a fleet of 6,775 buses in the city, and officials claimed that a year ago on an average, they used to have 70-80 buses breaking down on a daily basis, while on some days, the number used to cross even 100.
In the beginning of 2018, BMTC had started a comprehensive maintenance programme, which involved efforts to understand the health of each bus. Now officials claim that by December 2018, the number of breakdowns per day has come down to 30.
A senior BMTC official from mechanical department told Deccan Chronicle, "On an average daily breakdown had come down to 30 last December and in January 2019 the report says that it has fallen to 13. Our new setup of maintenance work at bus depots has really worked, we have also made sure there is no shortage of spare parts. We are working to bring it down to zero."
The BMTC has also recently adopted a new app in a few depots to track vehicle health management. It was tested in the Jayanagar depot and now it has been circulated among a few other depots. Once the vehicle defect is registered on the app, it will alert the depot instantly. Personnel from the department concerned will be on standby before the bus arrives at the depot, reducing the repair time, the official added.
However the commuters claim they still come across breakdowns and even high end Volvo buses are not immune to it. Abhilash R, a regular BMTC commuter, said, "BMTC claims that breakdowns have drastically come down due to the special training for the drives and better maintenance. But we are facing the same old problem of breakdowns, due to which we passengers have to stand on the roadside waiting for another bus. In one month I have faced this problem twice on Outer Ring Road with Volvo buses."
He felt a lot more needs to be done to ensure that BMTC buses encounter fewer breakdowns while ferrying commuters.
