Indore (Madhya Pradesh): The ideal, swiftest public transport, Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS), with i-buses has crashed. While the buses continue to run and ply every four minutes, commuters cannot get on them anymore without a wait of 30 to 60 minutes at least.
The trouble for over 60,000 commuters regularly using i-buses daily multiplies in the monsoon, as the process of ticketing falters. Commuters are enraged, but helpless, since many of them do not have a private vehicle in the city.
Some of the regular commuters attempted to complain to the authorities, but to no avail. “I had to wait for one hour today at the Vijay Nagar station just to get a ticket!” said Heena Verma, an angry commuter. She regularly uses the i-bus for going to work, but has been facing these issues for a week now.
“I had to wait for 25 minutes to get a ticket at the Satya Sai bus station and, then, they gave me a ticket without a barcode,” Jignesh Sharma, a student of DAVV, said. He added that this created issues for him when he was getting in and out of the station.
”You have to keep waiting for the attendant to open the gates for you, because nobody has a barcode to sign in and sign out of bus stations,” added Kishore Iswe, a digital marketer. He added that the trouble with tickets doubles the commute time.
“They can just run the buses like city buses if they’re failing to provide the quick transport that they promised,” Priya Thakur, another angry student, said.
The BRTS was built considering that Indore’s population stood at 1.6 million in 2001, and is projected to be 4.2 million by 2025. It is now already over 3.5 million. However, the system, despite regular updates, is now failing.
Atal Indore City Transport Services Ltd (AiCTSL), managing the plying of buses and the stations in Indore, has failed to provide a solution yet. Trying to explain the situation, a spokesperson said, “We’re currently facing network issues from the provider. Hence, the current updated system with barcodes is failing.” The person explained that they were using the previous normal ticketing system till the network was restored. “We’re, however, testing the new machines for an hour or so every day. So, maybe that’s the time when some commuters are experiencing a longer wait at the station,” the spokesperson added.
