“Who will take the pain to resolve the problems we are facing on roads? We are living in a country where the state provides facilities only to the wealthy people by depriving the common citizens who actually pay taxes which are supposed to be spent for their welfare and development purposes,” he says.
He said most of the commuters couldn’t afford to hire taxi or rickshaw to reach their destinations, but mismanagement on the part of departments concerned and a meager number of buses on city routes were adversely affecting their routine business. “The Punjab government has already closed a number of wagons on many routes, causing an acute shortage of public transport in the city.
“Private bus operators don’t have the required number of vehicles which only lead to overcrowding. While the poorly-maintained buses need immediate repair and maintenance as commuters have to face inconvenience when such vehicles break down in the middle of the journey,” he said.
Safdar Jamil, serving in a government department, criticized the role of the Lahore Transport Company (LTC) formed under the chief minister’s initiative to provide transport facilities to Lahorites.
“The LTC has done nothing to provide a trouble-free transport facility to the general public’, he said.
LTC’s enforcement general manager Fawad Qureshi said the company had planned to induct 2,000 new buses within two years.
“The LTC offers capital subsidy to potential bus operators for inducting new buses according to the approved specification. At the same time, the LTC will provide operational subsidy to existing and new bus operators based on a transparent system of the operational subsidy disbursal.
The draft for tendering modalities in the wake of inducting 2,000 new buses is in the final stages, he said.
Mr Qureshi admitted that the people were facing problems owing to an acute shortage of buses on all routes. He said only 400 buses, most of them in bad condition, were running in the metropolis for a population of nearly nine million.
Besides these buses, he said about 80,000 rickshaws and 6,000 wagons were operating in the city.
“Since its inception in February this year, the LTC has tried hard to involve all stakeholders for increasing the number of buses on all routes, but bus owners are not willing to bring more vehicles on roads because of financial crunch.
They (bus operators) are already facing financial hardships to get their 400 buses repaired,” he claimed.
He said bus operators could stop the service if the LTC tried to pile pressure on them to introduce more buses on different routes.
Muhammad Rashid, the general manager of a private bus company, termed the situation terrible not only for passengers but also for bus operators.
He said about 900 buses were in operation in Lahore two years back, but their number had gradually decreased to nearly 400 because of perpetual increase in fuel prices.
“We have time and again asked the LTC and the transport department to provide subsidy for getting repaired the existing fleet of buses, but to no avail,” he said.
He said the LTC was providing only 20 per cent subsidy to bus operators willing to run CNG buses in the provincial capital.
He suggested conducting a fresh survey for operating efficient and affordable transport system in Lahore.LTC chairman and former federal interior secretary Tasneem Noorani said the company would get more than 500 buses within three to four weeks.
“Our objective is to regulate the transport system and make it a viable and sustainable. We will adopt measures to provide qualitative and cheap transport facilities to Lahorites as per the vision and ini tiative of the Punjab chief minister.
“We will not run the buses on their own, but we will involve all transport stakeholders and even new comers to induct new buses under the banner and regulations of the LTC”.
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