Mumbai: Alarmed by bus fires, BEST takes 400 wet lease buses off road from today

Thousands of BEST passengers may face hardship from Thursday as 400 leased buses will go off road from Wednesday. This has come in the wake of three incidents of bus fires reported within a month.

A BEST bus was completely gutted in a fire at Agarkar Chowk, behind the Andheri police station, on Wednesday evening. It was doused in 20 minutes and no injuries were reported. Keeping in mind passengers safety, the administration, however, has taken this decision to prevent any further incidents. Earlier incidents occurred on January 25 near Bandra and on February 11 at Chakala.

The BEST administration tweeted on Wednesday, “In view of the recent incidents of fire in TATA CNG buses operated by M/s Mateshwari Urban Transport Ltd, BEST has decided to take all these 400 buses off road till the original manufacturer and operator takes necessary corrective measures to ensure that it will not happen in future.”

Most of these 400 buses were operated from Jogeshwari, Santacruz, Pratiksha Nagar and Dharavi bus depots. Until Wednesday, around 3,600 buses were being operated by BEST, which will reduce to 3,200 from today. Officials said extra buses from other BEST depots will be sent to the affected areas to accommodate passengers.

Officials said the move will inconvenience passengers but they can’t take any risk with safety. “There may be some changes in bus schedules owing to this. Commuters may keep this in mind while planning journeys for the next few days,” BEST further tweeted.