HD Kumaraswamy plan to ease BMTC losses

Raichur: Is Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy planning to lessen the burden of Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) which is incurring losses due to the operation of Volvo buses, by sharing these buses with other state owned transport corporations?

During an interaction with the media here on Wednesday, Mr Kumaraswamy said that the BMTC has about 1,000 Volvo buses and has been incurring losses due to their operations.

“For making profit, a Volvo bus has to run for a distance of 150 to 200 kms. To reduce the burden on BMTC, I have directed the officials to explore the possibility of sharing these buses with other transport corporations which have no such buses,” Mr Kumaraswamy said.

This raised the question whether the sharing of  Volvo buses would really help reduce their high maintenance costs and overheads.

However it was not possible to seek a clarification on the issue as Mr Kumaraswamy abruptly ended his interaction programme. He had recently reviewed the performance of the transport department and had announced that a decision has been taken to purchase 3,000 new buses.