The Hindu : Front Page : Hike in APSRTC fares ruled out

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Sunday, Jun 08, 2008
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Hike in APSRTC fares ruled out

Special Correspondent

‘Fares will not be raised even by a single paisa for any category of services’

HYDERABAD: A proposal by the Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC) management to increase bus fares and offset the burden caused by the steep hike in diesel prices was shot down by Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy here on Saturday.

He advised the transport undertaking to absorb the burden by improving internal efficiency.

The Chief Minister’s intervention comes as a relief to the travelling public who were bracing themselves for a hike in light of his announcement in Guntur on Friday that the fares may be marginally revised.

After discussions with the Chief Minister, APSRTC chairman M. Satyanarayana Rao and Managing Director V. Dinesh Reddy told reporters that the fares would not be raised even by a single paisa for any category of services.

In the face of the diesel price hike, they said, they wanted to run the APSRTC on commercial lines and proposed to increase the fares “considerably” for express, luxury, A/C and ghat road services to net a revenue of Rs. 179 crore and “marginally” for city buses and Palle Velugu services covering 86 per cent of villages, to get another Rs. 262 crore.

They were, however, happy at the Chief Minister’s decision not to place any burden on the common man.

Mr. Rao said the annual loss to the RTC due to the diesel price hike would be Rs. 305 crore for the remaining ten months of the current fiscal. Turning to Mr. Dinesh Reddy, he said: “He is well-versed in RTC and is capable of managing the situation”.

Non-traffic revenue

Mr. Dinesh Reddy said that the Corporation would increase its non-traffic revenue by constructing commercial complexes on its properties. On one such complex proposed on 9.5 acres at Musheerabad here, the RTC would net Rs. 100 crore in the next two days.

The network of bus services would be expanded to cover new areas and the frequency on existing routes increased by purchasing 3,000 buses.

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