Bhayandar : Fed up of repeated complaints from commuters of erratic and rickety bus services provided by the private bus operator, the Mira Bhayandar Municipal Corporation (MBMC) has now sought help of the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) and Brihanmumbai Electricity Supply and Transport (BEST) authorities to ply buses on various routes in the Mira-Bhayandar region.
Admitting the pathetic condition of the buses and the helplessness expressed by the private operator, civic chief Achyut Hange has requested both the authorities to operate their buses in the region till the arrival of 90 new buses to improve its own public transport utility.
The decision of seeking BEST and MSRTC help followed the decision taken at a joint meeting between the civic administration and all-party group leaders. The MSRTC had stalled its operations on the Bhayandar-Uttan route after the MBMC introduced its own public transport authority in the year 2005.
After operating bus services on its own for a couple of years, it adopted the Public-Private-Partnership format and inked a 10-year pact on a Build-Own-Operate-and-Transfer (BOOT) with Ulhasnagar based-Kestrel Infrastructure, which agreed to pay a royalty of Rs 1 per km.
However, the PPP model turned out to be a ‘Pro-Private-Player’ agreement that translated into a nightmare for local bus commuters who have been constantly complaining about the erratic bus frequency and the rickety condition of buses especially on the Bhayandar-Uttan-Manori routes.
As of now, less than 30 out of the fleet of 55 buses ply in and out of the twin-city. While the MBMT boasts of operating on 33 routes, buses on around 12 routes are non-operational apparently due to shortage of buses.
