What is long and red and is soon likely to be standing in a queue at night? No, the answer is not BEST buses in a traffic jam or at the depot, but at a petrol/diesel pump near you.
The next time you are getting your beloved vehicle tanked up in the dead of the night, don’t be surprised if there’s a BEST bus blocking your path. This will be the first time in years that BEST buses will queue up behind other vehicles outside petrol and diesel pumps for refills.
The public transport undertaking has more than 900 diesel buses, which will line up with other vehicles for fuel, as the cost of diesel for bulk buyers has gone up by Rs 25 per litre, at Rs 119.
Diesel prices in India have been increased by about Rs 25 per litre for bulk customers, as international oil prices jumped nearly 40 per cent amid the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war. However, the retail price of diesel remains unchanged. There are 900-plus diesel buses in its 3,540-strong fleet, or approximately 25 per cent of the fleet. So, for reasons of fuel economy, the Brihanmumbai Electricity Supply and Transport (BEST) Undertaking has decided to send its diesel buses to fuel stations across the city and suburbs for refuelling.
Confirming the news, the general manager of the BEST undertaking, Lokesh Chandra, said that they had no option but to ask their diesel-powered buses to queue up at gas stations.
“We have around 900 diesel buses, which also include those on wet-lease. These buses will be forced to go to retail fuel pumps at night for refuelling, as prices have touched Rs 119 per litre for bulk buyers of diesel,” Chandra said.
Sources said that in the last 15 days or so, the price of bulk diesel has gone up twice. The first time, it went up by Rs 5 per litre to Rs 94 and now, by a whopping Rs 25 per litre to Rs 119. The BEST has spent Rs 12 crore per month on diesel until now.
The cost of fuel for diesel buses is around Rs 40 per km; for CNG buses it is around Rs 26 per km; and for electric buses, it is Rs 9 per km. There are more than 225-odd petrol pumps across the city. Already, there are long queues of motorists lining up at these fuel pumps and once buses join the line, then the situation could become even more chaotic. However, the BEST officials said their buses would go to petrol pumps after 11pm, so that other motorists would not be inconvenienced.
“There is every possibility that BEST buses might come to refill at retail pumps now that the price of bulk diesel has risen steeply. We will have to work out traffic-related issues if these buses come there, to ensure that other vehicles are not inconvenienced,” said a petrol pump owner.
Meanwhile, the BEST officials claim that they are working out details of the ‘lifecycle-cost analysis’ of 185 of the 225 single-decker diesel buses. This involves working out the cost of these buses which have another 10 years of life and have run for 5 years so far. They had procured these 185 diesel buses for Rs 90 crore.
The BEST officials said that they will study the cost of these diesel buses if they are sold, or retrofitted into CNG buses to understand the impact on their finances. Further, the officials claim that in the next five years, the fleet will have 10,000 buses.
In March 2022, petrol pump sales have increased by a fifth, as bulk users, such as the operators of bus fleets and shopping malls, among others, purchased diesel in retail, instead of the usual practice of ordering directly from oil companies. Oil marketing companies had last revised petrol and diesel prices in November 2021. Since then, there has been no increase in fuel rates, despite the tremendous surge in global oil prices.
When contacted, a senior traffic police officer said, “No official communication regarding this has reached us yet. When we receive it, we will plan traffic arrangements accordingly. If BEST buses choose to refuel at petrol pumps at night, when the traffic is relatively less after peak hours, if need be, we will increase the manpower at night. We will see how things pan out on Day 1 of this arrangement and then further changes can be made.”
(With inputs from Priyanka Navalkar)
