Delhi is facing acute shortage of public transport as just 5,554 buses against the required number of 11,000 vehicles are plying in the Capital, the Supreme Court was informed on Thursday.
Affidavit filed
In an affidavit filed before the apex court, the Delhi government said its “all-out efforts” to augment a bus fleet to meet the requirement of 11,000 buses was hindered due to non-availability of land for depots and repeated failure of tenders issued by the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) for procurement of vehicles.
The Delhi government has said there are 1,275 low-floor AC buses, 2,506 low-floor non-AC buses and 101 green standard-floor non-AC buses. Besides these, 1,672 orange standard-low floor buses are being operated under the cluster scheme, which was introduced in 2011 to replace the erstwhile blue line buses, it said.
“The present fleet of buses in Delhi is 5,554 and the requirement is of 11,000 buses. The Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi [GNCTD] is making all-out efforts to augment the bus fleet to meet this requirement, but is hindered in its efforts due to non-availability of depot land to bring cluster buses and repeated failure of tenders issued by the DTC for procurement of buses,” the affidavit said.
It said that the Delhi cabinet had taken a decision on September 1 last year for inducting 2,000 standard floor buses through procurement of 1,000 buses by the DTC and engagement of 1,000 vehicles under the cluster scheme.
It said that the High Court had on June 1 this year stayed the implementation of this decision, which was at an advanced stage, and if the stay was vacated, 2,000 standard floor buses would be ready for induction.
