Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) and the police officials have put in place crowd control measures to handle the rush of people at Ukkadam and Singanallur bus stands from where special buses are being operated to various places for Deepavali.
TNSTC is operating closer to 420 buses from Coimbatore, Tirupur, Udhagamandalam and Erode.
A senior TNSTC official said that more than 130 buses are being operated from Coimbatore. Ten buses are being operated to Chennai, 50 to Madurai, 45 to Tiruchirapalli, 20 to Theni, two to Tirunelveli, two to Rajapalayam, two to Sivakasi, one to Kumbakonam, 20 to Udhagamandlaam, and two buses on the Udhagamandalam – Chennai sector. Advance reservation facility was provided for services to Tirunelveli, Rajapalayam, Sivakasi and Kumbakonam. In fact, the occupancy ratio had been more than 70 per cent till Wednesday and Thursday and was expected to go up from Thursday night and on Friday.
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TNSTC is operating around 90 buses from Tirupur and Erode respectively to southern districts. Anticipating heavy rush, the Corporation is keeping its buses and crew ready to operate up to 550 buses a day.
Bus bays had been clearly earmarked destination wise and barricading had been done to regulate the queue, said A. Murugasamy, Assistant Commissioner of Police (Law and Order – East). At Singanallur bus stand, 25 police personnel led by Inspector and Sub-Inspectors had been posted in addition to 15 home guards to regulate crowd.
TNSTC officials said that police personnel had been posted at the Ukkadam bus stand as well.
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The State Express Transport Corporation was operating nearly a dozen services on the Coimbatore – Chennai and Coimbatore – Bangalore sector and the number of services might be increased on Friday depending on the demand, they added.