Hi Prajas,
The BMTC bus fares have been hiked... and the monthly pass with the new revised rates have still not reached the pass-counters be it at BMTC major bus-stands (Majestic,Shivajinagar, KR Market) leave alone other bus-depots.
What takes them to be so laid back.. yesterday when I went to the BMTC bus-stand (Majestic) all the counters were closed, the clerks or who ever is that person designated at the pass-issue coutner was reading the news paper... on enquiry he said "Read the board"- A notice was in Kannada - which read "Pass will not be available today".. Well cannot they be customer-friendly - give more information without asking. Upon persistantly asking , one of the employees said may be tomorrow -- come and check at 7 AM.
Most of the passengers who use the monthly bus pass belong to the working community it becomes very difficult to check if the counter is opened or not especially when the authorities themselves are unware as to when the distribution is going to commence.
Bangalore-One also issues passes, but they get the stock very late - late evening, at times and one cannot check /recheck. Besides they have stareted issuing one per head pass ( some times two people from the same family will be using the monthly bus-pass) why cannot they issue to one person more than one pass- they insist on producing the id card, oops -
Why cannot they start issuing the monthly pass from 25th of every month- They can effectively use the services of Bangalore One , post-offices and also the why can't they give to the conductors or drivers too to issue the pass.
But as of now, it is already 30th of the month, yet the authorities are not sure of issuing the pass.
Introducing more buses is not the only service, the authorities need to be more professional and customer-friendly and atleast during the dates when the monthly pass have to be issued, they need to open the counters atleast by 7 AM and not at 8 AM as i have seen in Domlur, Bapujinagar, Chandralayout.. If the day of issue falls on Sunday, the pass counters need to be opened across all pass issue counters. Such laid back attitude on the part of authotrities is highly deplorable.
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Comments
Private buses necessary
I think it is high time govt. allows private companies to ply buses within the city. BMTC is callous because of their monopoly. Lot has been done in terms of routes introduced. But when it comes to maintaining schedule, providing information, facilities, BMTC is far from satisfactory. I sincerely wish private transport comes into the city which can change the way BMTC looks at providing services.
Absolutely, it is time
At a minimum, BMTC needs to have an effective compliants management system where we can log requests and complaints, and BMTC responds saying no or yes with timelins.
BMTC is one body that can have the most dramatic positive impact on quality of life in Bengaluru. Hope their team realizes that.
Neeyathi - bang on
When you say this:
you are bang on. Just look at the 6 Bus Days so far. What we have got so far is mostly new routes and more buses.
muthusubs - more bang on
muthusubs is more bang on than Neeyathi.
I don't think anything other than competition from private players can change the ways of the BMTC lot. Indian Airlines, Air-India, BSNL, etc were as bad or worse when they were monopolies. Look at how they have changed, atleast in service aspects, after these were opened out. There's absolutely no reason why the monopoly should continue. The way to go is this or variation thereof.
I have myself applied to the government for a license to operate 'stage carriage' (meaning regular bus services - that's the differentiation that has to go first) services, to begin with as 'feeder services' to the Big-10. The government is making me run around, and I am countering them through RTI. At the end of it all, I propose to lodge a fresh PIL.
Do join me and start demanding from roof-tops.