‘Panchayat Poll Effect – 80% Private Buses Off The Roads, Situation To Be Clear After 2 Days – Operators ‘

An association of private bus owners said that with 80 per cent of private buses remaining off the city’s roads in the wake of the West Bengal panchayat elections and subsequent recycling on Monday, passenger problems will continue for at least another two days.

Of the 32,000 private buses operating on the city’s various routes daily, only about 1,200 reached the roads on Monday, Tapan Banerjee, general secretary of the Joint Council of the Bus Association, the apex body for private bus owners, told PTI.

“Majority of our workforce comes from rural areas in North and South 24 Parganas, Howrah and Hooghly districts, who have not yet returned after exercising their franchise right on July 8. Many of them are awaiting survey results and assessing the situation before turning back,” Banerjee said.

“We have to wait at least two more days,” he added.

In addition to the meager workforce, hundreds of buses ordered by the state government to ferry poll officials and security personnel to rural areas have not yet returned.

“Since the central forces will continue to remain in their deployment areas for some time even after the end of the polling process, there will be a shortage of buses for a few more days,” he said.

A transportation department official said 50 percent of the state-run buses, which carry about 20 percent of the city’s passenger load, are also on polling duty and are likely to return on Tuesday.

“We will ask private bus operators to get the entire fleet back on the road by July 12,” he said.

(This story was not edited by the News18 staff and was published from a syndicated news agency feed – PTI)