Andhra Pradesh: High bus fare irks Tirumala pilgrims

Vijayawada: Pilgrims to Tirumala have been raising objections over the bus ticket fare from Tirupati to Tirumala. RTC has issued around 9.000 bus passes to the TTD employees and the same burden has been transferred to the pilgrims.

Mr T.P.V. Ramnath Naidu, a mobile company sales executive from Tirupati, has sent a communication in this regard to Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan and transport minister Sidda Raghava Rao, seeking their intervention.

While the Lord of Seven Hills has been providing direct employment to 30,000 people, independent of endowments, and supporting the cause of two universities and a teaching hospital and various government schemes, the RTC too could ask for assistance or subsidy, Mr Ramnath Naidu asked in his letter.

“Instead of collecting Rs 45 per ticket to Tirumala from Tirupati in RTC buses, the RTC can go in for a subsidy arrangement with the TTD, as around 9,000 TTD employees are getting subsidy from RTC,” he wrote.

Since the TTD is financially sound and can bear the burden of the travel expenses of the pilgrims, at least to some extent, the RTC also can add a little value addition to this holy exercise, he wrote.

When the same issue was brought to the notice of Tirumala RTC depot manager K.L.N. Reddy, he told this correspondent that the TTD had been sharing two-thirds of the burden and the RTC bearing the rest.