Mumbai: Aamchi Mumbai Aamchi BEST (AMAB) had written a letter to the Deonar bus depot demanding adequate BEST bus routes in M/E wards to Shatabdi hospital.
The residents said three bus routes are urgently required from Trombay bus depot to Shatabdi hospital in Govandi East, Anushakti Nagar bus depot to Shatabdi hospital via Mohitte Patil and Lallubhai compound. Shivaji Nagar bus depot to Shatabdi hospital in Govandi east.
In the letter, AMAB said the commuters face problems as the routes were scrapped and extremely poor frequency of buses. This has huge impacts in many parts of the city.
According to the letter, M/E ward of Mumbai has the highest percentage of people living in slums (85%) as compared to other wards. Large settlements, such as Shivaji Nagar, Mankhurd, Deonar, Cheetah Camp, provides homes to lakh of predominantly low-income people in this city.
The health of this population depends on their abilty to access the city’s public health system-consisting of health post-partum centers, clinics, maternity hospitals, general hospitals.
In the M/E ward itself, the only public hospital is Shatabdi hospital. A majority of people visit this hospital for cure and treatment. A significantly large number of TB patients get treatment here.
One of the major barriers for them to access the hopital is the absence of adequate public buses and bus routes that connects these worker settlements to the hospitals.
Last year, when BEST discontinued many of its routes in the name of ‘route rationalisation’. Many settlements were disconnected from the facility.
