The Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) has decided not to renew the wet lease agreement with a private company that provided multi-axle buses citing poor service. The present agreement will end by November 1.
For the corporation, the wet leasing of 10 multi-axle Scania buses from Maha Voyage, a company based in Maharashtra, has resulted in heavy loss.
It was five years ago, the KSRTC commenced its premium inter-State services using wet-leased multi-axle buses. But, the corporation has been incurring huge losses except on peak days and festival season.
KSRTC Chairman and Managing Director Biju Prabhakar told The Hindu that the corporation would invite fresh tenders for multi-axle buses.
Sources said the buses had become a liability for the corporation on inter-State routes such as Bengaluru and Kollur-Mookambika. In April, of the total 90 services scheduled, only 75 were operated. Similarly, 38 and 48 schedules were not operated in May and June respectively.
As per the agreement, it was the responsibility of the lessor to provide a replacement within 24 hours if the bus developed a technical snag or a bus was halted due to issues related to the lessor.
The non-availability of buses on time had been posing a big headache to the corporation. It was also giving rent of ₹43 per km to the lessor. On most days, the corporation was incurring a loss of around ₹10,000-20,000 per trip due to poor patronage.
Now, the corporation has decided to invite tenders for procuring 102 new buses, including eight Volvo multi-axle buses, 22 AC sleeper buses, and 72 super deluxe buses for operations under the KSRTC-SWIFT. This is expected to replace the wet-leased buses on inter-State routes.
The corporation has owns 17 multi-axle buses which operates on various routes.
