BMTC and Corruption

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Lot of posts and comments on bad practices around tickets, and possibility of organized corruption inside BMTC around Bus operations. Some say that pilferage levels are too high, though there is no real data to either show the level of pilferage, or compare with estimates from transportation companies.

Creating this wiki/book to hold together popular references or discussions on the subject of corruption in BMTC.

BMTC Drivers issuing used tickets

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Many BMTC Drivers and conductors (Mainly ordinary, pushpak and suvarna) are issuing used tickets. It works like this: I buy a ticket for say 30 Rs. Say I do not have change and I hand over Rs. 100 to the conductor/driver then he writes at the top on the back side of one ticket the amount he has to return me back (Rs 70). While asking for the money when it's time for me to get down, he will give me Rs 70 but keep the ticket, which he will issue to new passengers on the same route. This he carefully manages delaying updating his file where he needs to put in the ticket numbers that have been issued periodically.

This is happening at a huge rate and I am certain this will eat into BMTC's profilts. Every second day either I can see this happening or even at time I have also been issued torn tickets not from the booklet but from old tickets maintained cleverly inside that, or sometimes the conductors/drivers have refused to return my tickets!!

I would request BMTC officials to issue strong instructions to Drivers and Conductors in this regard. I have been arguing with these people for quite some time, but I do not think I can fix this problem myself unless I see some action from BMTC.

Thanking you,

Akshay

BMTC, corruption and ticket-less rides

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So I did it, in fact twice now. Entered xxxE, knowing fully well that fare to my destination was Rs 6. Took out two 2 rupee coins - no ticket given, no questions asked. Next, I tried this in a Volvo xxxC. Was a bit nervous doing it, and must tell you that I succeeded only in my third attempt at this. Entered the bus, and when conductor passed by asking for tickets, I ignored him. When getting down at my destination, told him that hey, I forgot to buy the ticket. Promptly, I was asked for an amount which was lower than the fare amount (Rs 35). Somehow, felt uncomfortable cheating the bleeding Volvos, I said no, I want a ticket, and paid the full amount.

Hope you get the point. You can do it, easily in the regular buses, and not so easily in the Volvos. Now, to the analytical part - can we really estimate the volume of "corruption" here? How much money could BMTC be losing per day to such ticket-less rides? If we can estimate the "loss" or the "leak" - say Rs xx crores per month - then we will have numbers to build or justify a business case for BMTC to invest in systems or solutions to plug this leak.

Perhaps like this:

  • Total ticket revenue BMTC reports (from last annual report)
  • Assume average ticket amount, and average bus loads
  • Compare this with "observation" - like, from my observations inside 333E, 328c, 323 etc, I see 4-7 out of 60-70 going ticket-less
  • Compare the two - average load/amount based "gap", and observation estimate based "gap"
  • Then, some final numbers, and may be guess the per person 'corruption' amounts.

This is sort of like my past attempt at estimating the volume of corruption in Traffic Police's fine system. Wrote that post with hopes of getting loads of inputs and criticism, but it was not to be :). No worries.

Lets start

Thanks to the good work of Manjari/Rithesh/Syed/Shekhar and few more members, BMTC's stats are all available right here on Praja. See http://praja.in/gyan/info... and http://praja.in/discuss/f...

Enough datapoints there to make our guesses. Lets start then.

Key daily stats on BMTC

  • Makes 73240 trips
  • Performs 11.78 Lakhs Service Kilometres
  • Carries more than 38.00 Lakhs Passengers
  • Earns around Rs.258.54 lakhs
  • Everyday, about 1.82 lakhs daily passes are issued

Let us question that passenger volume stat - 38 lakh everyday - is that an estimate on number of actual people carried, or number of tickets sold? I will assume number of tickets sold (aka passenger trips).

So tickets sold per trip would be 38 lakh / 73420 = 52.

11.78 lakh service kilometers divided by 73240 = 16 km,  average length of a trip.

So 52 tickets sold per 16 km long trip.

Assumption time now.

  • assume avg BMTC bus capacity to be 50 (seat + stand).
  • assume that if averaged over a day/week, BMTC buses are 60% full. Reasonable I would say, 120% full during rush hour, and 40% rest of the day :)
  • Assume average commuter trip length of 8 km. Avg ticket cost is 258.58 lakh / 38 lakh = Rs 6.8. That amount will not take you much farther than 8 km.

With above assumptions, you would sell 60 tickets during a 16 km long trip. [60% of 50 x 16/8 = 30 x 2 = 60]

60 vs 52 = thats a leak of 15% on actuals (8/52 * 100).

How does this fit with our 'observations'. I have spied around on a few bus journies. 4 out of 60 once. 7 out of 70 another time. Not that off from the assumption driven calculations. Plus its hard to spy on the condcutor in a crowded bus.

Oh yeah, lot of assupmtions there. But how else can you guess all this?

Now, lets guess the personal gains.

Assume all of 258.58 lakh is daily traffic revenue. 15% of 258 ~ 38 lakhs a day.

That is Rs 11 crores a month.

Refer back to BMTC's statistics on workforce. Dedicated workforce of 20473

  1. Drivers (7489)
  2. conductors (5775)
  3. Driver / Conductors (3610)
  4. Maintenance staff (2107)
  5. administrative staff and others (1492)

Lets assume all this money is going to #1 #2 and #3 above. 7489 + 5775 + 3610 = 16874 people.

Rs 11 crore divided by 16874 = Rs 6500 per person per month.

Rs 6500 per month per person, possible personal share from the spoils from our ticket-less rides on BMTC.

How do you like that number?

PS1: Important Disclaimer - I am not claiming any accuracy on all this stats, I am not speculating any rackets either. I have no first hand information on the full and real scale of this possible corruption inside BMTC. I am just crunching numbers from BMTC, some observations on-ground, and a few assumptions to suggest a possibility.

PS2: A Request - Let us discuss the solutions (smart card, daily traveler credit , rfid tickets etc etc) in a separate thread.

Conductors of BMTC reusing already sold or old tickets.

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I happen to take the BMTC bus everyday to my office, however recently i encountered a situation where the conductor handed out a used ticket to me instead of tearing a new ticket from the foil. By the look of the ticket even a lame man could say that its an old ticket with traces of sand and dirt and torn edges. When i questioned him about the issue of old ticket he refused to accept his mistake and said it to be a freshly torn ticket. I was so helpless and did not get support from any of the so-passengers and had to return with the same ticket. This has not happened only to me and when discussed with some of my friends, they also complained of having faced the same issue earlier.

These conductors are not only causing a loss to the BMTC but also to the passengers, the situation is worse when some illiterates or school children alight the buses, many a times the conductors take the money and not issue the ticket for short distances thus pocketing the extra money into their personal account which actually belongs to the BMTC.

This could rather be called a daylight theft.

Some authority needs to look into this and get this right immediately...

I happen to take the BMTC bus everyday to my office, however recently i encountered a situation where the conductor handed out a used ticket to me instead of tearing a new ticket from the foil. By the look of the ticket even a lame man could say that its an old ticket with traces of sand and dirt and torn edges. When i questioned him about the issue of old ticket he refused to accept his mistake and said it to be a freshly torn ticket. I was so helpless and did not get support from any of the so-passengers and had to return with the same ticket. This has not happened only to me and when discussed with some of my friends, they also complained of having faced the same issue earlier.

These conductors are not only causing a loss to the BMTC but also to the passengers, the situation is worse when some illiterates or school children alight the buses, many a times the conductors take the money and not issue the ticket for short distances thus pocketing the extra money into their personal account which actually belongs to the BMTC.

This could rather be called a daylight theft.

Some authority needs to look into this and get this right immediately...

 

 

Corruption in the BMTC - Tickets

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Tickets not issued in BMTC buses -  The conductor asks commuters to opt for ticketless travel, by paying an amount lesser than the ticket value. Surprisingly, this is a regular practice.

Here are the details. I boarded a BMTC bus(KA-01 F2822, reached sony world at 11:30 pm) at canara bank bus stop at Kormangala. The conductor, a lady (very busy on her mobile) asked me for the ticket. I asked her to issue a ticket to Hero Honda stop and handed her Rs 7, the exact change for the ticket. She returns Rs 1 change stating that I need not take the ticket. When I insist on a ticket, she demands Rs 2 more rather rudely (while still talking on her mobile) and then issues a Rs 8 ticket.

She says the ticket prices have increased and the ticket which was priced at Rs 7 would now cost Rs 8. With the BMTC staff siphoning off the BMTC revenue through their newly introduced ticket less travel option,the travel cost for citizens is bound to increase causing lot of inconvenience to the common man.

Request everyone's support in putting an end to this form of corruption.

Reporting BMTC ticket corruption

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Further from those posts on ticket-less corruption in BMTC, we now have a way of reporting these incidents. Yes, it is an Internet based system, so the complaints about this not being available to majority of BMTC commuters etc etc apply. Still, something is better than nothing.

The system, called "Correct ticket, collect ticket" is available at http://btis.in/bus/ticket

If we could have an easy way of reporting this from mobile phones - may be just SMS bus route number, bus registration number, and conductor number to report a ticket issue problem, that could see better usage.

Further, I am not sure how the information logged here will be acted upon. For all you know, this could be used to target some conductors - that possibility exists, isn't it? Perhaps the complaint logged here would first lead to a single day audit of ticket sales on the given bus, and if a same conductor gets reported a few times, perhaps a focused audit of the routes he has been on.

Also, wouldn't it be nice to report the "bribe givers" as well? Some fear needs to be put inside them as well, targeting just the "bribe takers" might be a tad unfair.