The Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) has ordered the merger of the Mysuru Urban and Mysuru Rural divisions as part of restructuring of its operations in the district.
A decision to this effect was taken recently and the excess staff of the merged units will be redeployed in other divisions of the state road transport corporation where there is a scarcity of manpower.
Divisional Controller Srinivas confirmed the developments and said that the decision was taken by the head office and will help in streamlining of the operations and redeployment of excessive manpower besides leading to savings. However, it will have no bearing on the existing services being provided by the rural and the urban divisions.
Mr. Srinivas said there were nearly 2,000 employees in the two divisions and the merger exercise will not only lead to savings but better utilisation of manpower.
The decision was takenby the KSRTC Central office in Bengaluru in its meeting last month and the orders have been issued, he added.
Consequently, the Bannimantap and the rural units will be wound up. A decision has also been taken to augment the non-ticketing and non-fare revenue component by letting out the existing properties of the KSRTC rural division.
The order states that following the merger, the divisional workshop and the offices too will be shut down and the existing office and other space will be let out for commercial use and rentals to augment the revenue through non-transportation mode.
Sources said though the merger and amalgamation of different units or divisions of the KSRTC was in the pipeline since years, it gained traction owing to the pandemic-induced losses. The merger exercise is expected to save cost-overheads besides streamlining services. The operations of the existing fleet of buses are also expected to be optimised. Put together the Mysuru rural and Mysuru urban divisions have about 1,200 buses in their fleet.
However, a section of the employees said that instead of merging the divisions – whose operations were clearly delineated as urban and rural – the authorities should take steps to unify the KSRTC in to a single organisation. The Government had hived off the KSRTC into four state transport corporations two decades ago resulting in creation of additional posts and increase in overhead costs. The employees say this has resulted in recurring expenditure leading to accumulating loss of the organisation.
