After a gap of 10 years, the State government on Thursday announced a hike in the fares of Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) bus services.
While Transport Department officials said that the move was long overdue, bus passengers and urban transportation experts expressed reservations. They pointed out that even if the fare hike was inevitable, the government must clearly list out the proposed improvements in service benchmarks that passengers would be entitled to in exchange for paying a higher fare.
The fare hike is across the board and would be highest for the premium air-conditioned Volvo services, MTC Managing Director S.Bhoopathy said.
Official estimates put MTC's daily operational loss at Rs.60 lakh. “Due to the financial crunch, we are unable to provide even basic infrastructural requirements,” a government official said. “There are just 25 bus depots in the city, whereas our fleet of 3,000 buses require at least 65 depots. In some of the depots, over 200-250 buses are being stacked closely like boxes.”
He added that when the existing fare structure came into effect a decade ago, the retail price of diesel was around Rs.18 per litre. Now, the fuel price had gone up to over Rs.43 per litre.
However, commuters such as T. Ravikumar, president of the Bus and Train Passengers' Welfare Association, say norms stipulate that two per cent of the revenue from each ticket should go towards the provision of basic amenities such as comfortable seating, lighting and first-aid boxes. “Till now, there has been no maintenance of buses or provision of such facilities.”
Many also point to an unofficial fare hike that is already in place in the form of M service buses. Being a government undertaking, MTC has an obligation to operate 40 per cent of its fleet as ‘ordinary services' that have the lowest base fare. “The base fare of Rs.2 existed only on paper,” said K.P. Subramanian, former professor, Urban Engineering Department, Anna University.
K. Chenganvarayan, who regularly takes an MTC bus between Perambur and Nungambakkam, said: “Luxury buses are accessed by a certain section of the population. There are people who do not wish to spend more than Rs.10 a day on transport and they will wait for hours at a bus stop, even if it means eventually getting into a crowded bus.”
The fare revision that will come into effect on Friday addresses this issue by doing away with the ‘M service' category. All ticket denominations will also be whole numbers.
The larger problem of inadequate or poor quality public transport still persists though, said Mr. Subramanian. “Fare revision by proxy that existed till now is a form of exploitation of the people, especially because the quality of public transport has completely declined. If the official increase in fare translates to better quality of service, then it is welcome. There is a certain degree of willingness to pay. What is the point in offering the lowest fare for the worst service anyway?”
He added that unless the State government provides an operational subsidy, transport corporations should be allowed to increase fare in a transparent manner every time there is a diesel price hike. Among the major metropolitan cities, only Bangalore has an autonomous fare revision committee.
R. Balasubramanian, a former Managing Director of MTC, said: “The government must first realise that mobility is a necessity for economic development. Ideally, public transport must be made free for everyone and it must be subsidised through a combination of Central and State government assistance. In most U.S. cities, 65 per cent of the public transit expenditure is federally funded.”
