The tourism and transportation industries have been greatly affected due to the ongoing COVID pandemic and rising fuel prices. The Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) is also facing a huge crisis on the money front. Unions have alleged that the MSRTC doesn’t even have funds to pay for the diesel. In today’s article will be looking at this fuel crisis that has hit Maharashtra transport and the response of the concerned authorities.
What is the issue?
The Unions have alleged that the state transportation is unable to pay for diesel. The drivers and conductors on duty in buses cancelled due to this have been asked to take a leave. The corporation is also unable to pay drivers salaries for a few months. Another issue is the vaccination of the staff. Only 50% of the staff has got fully vaccinated. The process has been slowed down at the local level many times, due to the depot managers not adjusting the leaves required for vaccination. This comes at a time when MSRTC is planning to run 2,200 additional buses from Mumbai to Konkan for the Ganesh festival.
Government response
The government has said that due to the lockdown it has to cut down on costs and make the operations viable again. On the allegations that staff is asked to leave, The administration has asked bus depots to send off such instances if any and sought the factual position. On vaccination, the authorities said the staff is getting vaccinated as per availability and that they would be able to cover the entire staff soon.
Official statements
The general secretary of Maharashtra ST Karmachari Congress, Shrirang Barge, said “Salaries have been delayed for some months now. There is always a question of when the next salary will arrive. There is no money for diesel to run buses and when buses are cancelled due to this, the staff is asked to take leave. It is a crisis,” he further added ” “Another area of concern is the vaccination of staff. Of the 97,000 staff members, about 55,516 have been vaccinated, which is just about 50 per cent. Now the process has further slowed down as at the local level many a time, the depot managers do not adjust leaves required for vaccination. In districts like Jalna, Latur, Amravati, Buldhana and Wardha, the progress has been dismal with only 20% of MSRTC staff having been vaccinated”.
MSRTC chairman, Anil Parab, said: “A long-term plan has been chalked to bail out the corporation, including procuring buses on a lease, converting a few into Liquified Natural Gas fuel (LNG) and Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) and rebuilding a few old buses into lorries to ferry cargo to save costs and bring in revenue”.
This was our information on the fuel crisis that has hit Maharashtra transport. If you have car buying doubts click here to ask! Get the lowest price for car insurance here. For more such content stay subscribed to MotorOctane Youtube, Google News Facebook and Twitter. Also, follow us on Flipboard and Reddit where we have a discussion community.
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