Transporters cut fares by 5pc but only for diesel buses

Karachi
The Sindh transport and mass transit department on Friday managed to convince the owners of intra-city bus owners to reduce fares by seven to twelve percent on diesel buses, which comprise only 10 percent of the total number of public transport vehicles plying in the city.
The Sindh government had announced on Thursday to reduce intra-city bus fares by 7 to 12 percent with immediate effect, but the transporters had refused on grounds that CNG prices had stayed the same. According to the president of Karachi Transport Ittehad (KTI), Irshad Bukhari, slashing fares on buses consuming CNG was out of the question because its prices showed no signs of dropping.
Initially, the transporters had refused to reduce fares for the third time following the latest slash in petroleum prices on orders of the prime minister.
However, the transporters had convened a meeting to discuss the matter after which a delegation led by Bukhari presented its decisions to the transport department.
Eventually, it was decided that five percent fares of buses running on diesel would be reduced while those operating on CNG will continue charging the existing fares from passengers.
In the past three months, there have been three drops in the prices of petroleum products. After the latest reduction, the price of diesel dropped to Rs94 per litre from Rs103.5 per litre while the price of petrol dropped to Rs84.5 per litre from Rs94 per litre.
After the first slash in petroleum prices, the transporters had reluctantly agreed to make Rs1 reduction in fares but even that had not been carried out.
The government did not even bother to ask the transporters to decrease fares after the second major drop in POL prices.
However, after the third slash in prices on orders of the prime minister at the beginning of the New Year, the Sindh transport department on Thursday had issued a notification to reduce public transport fares by seven to 12 percent.
The transporters had at first refused citing the stagnant CNG prices as an argument, but then on Friday they conceded to decrease fares by five percent but only for diesel buses, which form 10 percent of the total public buses strength in the city.
According to Bukhari, revised fares will be applicable from Monday. When asked about the transporters’ refusal to decrease bus fares, he said, “We are still running buses on less fare than Punjab. The transport business has already been suffering greatly because of the mass advent of Qingqi rickshaws in the city and the number of buses has reduced to 10,000 from 24,000 in the past three years. If the situation remains the same then there would hardly be any buses left on the roads.”
However, the citizens have demanded from the government to put pressure on transporters to further decrease the fares. Unfortunately, almost all the public buses have been modified to run on CNG, giving them an excuse to overcharge passengers.
According to Bukhari, the minimum fare for a public bus was Rs10 while the maximum was Rs17.
Talking to The News, Zulekha who works as domestic help, said that she paid Rs15 for her daily commute. “Sometimes the bus conductor even refuses to pay me back the change after I hand him a Rs20 note,” she said. “But when a customer pays a rupee less, they create such a rumpus.”
Other commuters while talking to The News, demanded that an official list of fares be displayed inside buses for the benefit of commuters.