An already financially-beleaguered A.P. State Road Transport Corporation bore the brunt of the strike in Andhra and Rayalaseema, with a meagre 112 buses out of 11,685 being allowed to run on the roads in the two regions.
Transport Minister Botcha Satyanarayana has said that though the government was trying to provide alternative services it would be a difficult task. On Tuesday, he appealed to RTC employees unions to withdraw their strike.
Earlier, APSRTC Managing Director A.K. Khan who attended a meeting with the Chief Secretary said the Corporation’s losses would mount further and with RTC employees joining the indefinite strike, it would mean losing crores every day. He appealed to employees to resume services to Tirumala as it was not safe to allow relatively inexperienced private bus drivers to ply on the ghat road.
On Tuesday , the loss due to non-operation of buses was estimated at Rs.13 crore, the highest on a single day, since July 31. The average daily loss was Rs.9 crore but it peaked on Tuesday with a near total halt to the corporation’s services, said G.V. Ramana Rao, RTC’s Executive Director-Operations, adding that the cumulative losses had crossed Rs.115 crore.
Meanwhile, the State government got into ‘standard operating procedure’ mode. It issued an order permitting all private operators to run their buses on designated RTC routes across the two regions on payment of Rs.100 per day as motor vehicle tax. Government also permitted the RTC to take up recruitment of temporary drivers.
