Thrissur: November 1 bus strike plan withdrawn

Thrissur: The private bus operators have withdrawn their call for an indefinite strike from November 1.  

Transport minister  A. K. Saseendran, after the meeting with their leaders here on Saturday, said a commission would be looking into their demand for a hike in fares given the soaring fuel prices."The commission will be submitting its report within a month," he told reporters.

"In the meeting, they told me that the government needs to give them some relaxations in terms transport rules so that they could go about their business without losses."

All Kerala Private Bus Operators Co-ordination Committee made the strike call on October 6 here, claiming the support of 9,000 private buses out of 12,600."Last time, when the bus fare was hiked in the state, the diesel charge was Rs 62. Now the Union government has brought the price down from Rs 80 to Rs 78 by slashing taxes. That is not enough for us to take forward our operations in a profitable way," general secretary of the co-ordination committee T. Gopinathan said.

They demand to hike the minimum charge from Rs 8 to 10 and to raise the minimum concession rate of students to Rs 5.