We're drawing up a workable revenue generating model for BMTC: MD

The first thing that IAS officer Sathyavathi G did before taking charge as managing director of Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) a year ago in April, was to take a ride on a BMTC bus as an ordinary commuter to understand what ails the service and what needs to be done. She spent an entire day hopping from one bus to another, striking up conversations with drivers, conductors and fellow commuters. This, she says, gave her the perfect start to handling a fleet of almost 6,750 buses and 29,950-plus employees. Sathyavathi takes time off to chat with Nina C George of DH about how she plans to rehaul the BMTC.

Excerpts from the interview:

Isn’t the allocation made to increase BMTC’s fleet strength meagre in the just-announced state budget?

As a Road Transport Corporation (RTC), we have to be self-sustained and self-sufficient. The government will support us as and when required, but we have to generate our own internal resources. This budget, I feel, has been quite satisfactory in terms of allocation for the corporations. We don’t have a shortage of buses but there’s a shortage of crew to run them. We are coming up with a robust plan to address the issue of staff shortage.

BMTC was working with Tummoc to develop a mobile app. What happened?

Tummoc is handling our digital bus passes. We want to launch mobile ticketing and Tummoc has given a proposal for the same. But mobile ticketing raises serious concerns about payment gateways and transactions. We are still talking to banks and service providers about linking ticketing services. We also have an MoU with Tummoc.

Though the Centre allocated 1,500 e-buses to BMTC last year, the utility issued work orders to only 921. Why?

We had requested for 1,500 and they were all coming with subsidies but similar allocations were also made to other STUs like Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad as well. We ended up getting only 921 EV buses with subsidy and the remaining would have to be procured without subsidy. So, we took up only 921 buses and we decided on adding about 10 double-decker EV buses. We have called for tenders and are in the process of finalising them.

What are your plans to ensure the safety of passengers, women in particular?

Safety is directly proportional to good infrastructure and BMTC is dependent on agencies such as BDA, BBMP and Metro for bus bays, bus shelters with good lighting and CCTV cameras. We have sent a proposal to BBMP to build about 100 bus bays at strategic locations across the city and asked for bus shelters with proper lighting. We also propose to have a passenger information system at about 500 bus shelters. We will soon launch a mobile app with an SOS button under the Nirbhaya scheme. While 5,000 buses in the existing fleet have panic buttons, all new buses will have them at every seat. There will be more CCTV coverage of buses, especially the new EVs, that are hitting the road soon

How challenging is it for BMTC to meet its revenue target?

In 2018, the diesel price was Rs 57, today it is Rs 87. 61. We generate a total revenue of about Rs 130 crore a month. Pre-Covid, we had about 35 lakh passengers daily but it has dipped to 28 lakh. Our main revenue comes from ticket sales and passes. The net salary expenditure is about Rs 70 crore and diesel costs Rs 60 crore. There are other liabilities too. Where is the profit? Fare revision has not taken place since 2015. The need of the hour is generating non-traffic revenue and one way to do so is to monetise BMTC’s assets like buildings and vacant lands. We are working on drawing up a workable revenue generating model for BMTC.

Any plans of inducting women drivers?

There are 2,800 women employees who work as conductors, security guards and constables and mechanics. We will soon induct four women drivers. They are getting trained to drive the EV buses.