Oppn. walkout over bus fare hike

By Our Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, OCT. 17. The Opposition Left Democratic Front (LDF) staged a walkout from the Assembly today following denial of leave for a discussion on the recent bus fare hike.

While seeking leave for adjournment of the House to discuss the issue, the Opposition accused the Government of having placed a heavy burden on the travelling public to enable private bus operators to reap hefty profits. Although the fare hike had been effected in the name of bailing out the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) out of a financial crisis, the actual beneficiaries of the hike were the private bus operators and parallel service operators, they contended.

The Transport Minister, Mr. K.B. Ganesh Kumar, said the KSRTC's revenue had gone up by 22.62 per cent per kilometre following the fare revision. The earnings per bus also had increased by 25.08 per cent. As the Government had enhanced the tax on private buses, the Government was set to earn around Rs. 60 crores as a result of the fare hike. The Government had tried to curb operation of parallel services, but had faced resistance from some of the pro-Left trade unions, he added.

Seeking leave for the Opposition-sponsored adjournment motion, the Kerala Congress(J) member, Mr. P.C. George, said the private bus operators would stand to gain Rs. 809 crores a year as a result of the fare revision where as the KSRTC would get only marginal benefit from the measure. He accused the Government of having falsified the figures relating to the KSRTC's losses and said that though the Government had effected a 25 per cent increase in fares, the KSRTC's revenue had not increased commensurately. People were deserting the KSRTC and opting to travel by train as the train fares were far less than the bus fares, he pointed out.

Leading the walkout, the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. V.S. Achuthanandan, said the fare hike had turned Kerala into a State having the highest bus fares in the country. The Government, he said, was resorting to indiscriminate trip cancellation to help parallel service operators. The Opposition had no objection to measures being taken to check proliferation of parallel services, he said.

The Opposition members came very close to a confrontation with the Speaker, Mr. Vakkom B. Purushothaman, when he denied permission to leaders of other LDF constituents to speak before leading their partymen out of the House. Although the leaders pleaded with him quite a while, he did not relent. After waiting for some time, several Opposition barged into the well of the House. When he found the situation going out of control, the Speaker allowed the leaders to make brief statements.

Mr. K.P. Rajendran (CPI) said the Government would have to face a strong movement of the people if it did not review the decision to hike bus fares. Dr. A. Neelalohithadasan Nadar (Janata Dal-S) said parallel services were proliferating as the KSRTC was not able to operate services on the nationalised routes. Dr. K.C. Joseph (KC-J) said though the Government had claimed that it had increased the fares by only 25 per cent, people were bearing a much higher dose of the fare hike on account of the unscientific fare stages.

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Section  : Southern States
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