[sustran] CAG favours independent body to fix bus fares

Vinay Baindur yanivbin at gmail.com
Sun Mar 21 15:02:08 JST 2010


 *By Express News Service
20 Mar 2010 07:11:27 AM IST*

 *CAG favours independent body to fix bus fares*
BANGALORE: The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) has
recommended an independent body like the Karnataka Electricity Regulatory
Commission (KERC) to regulate fares and services of all state-run transport
corporations, including BMTC (Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation).
This recommendation was made in the CAG report for the year ending March 31,
2009 (commercial) that was placed in the Legislative Assembly on Friday.
The report said that though the transportation fares were being revised by
the government whenever there was an increase in the cost of fuel and
dearness allowance, the revision did not take into consideration the
increase in operational cost. So it was desirable to have a regulatory body
to fix the rates.
The report also pointed out that the corporations can also increase their
profits by tapping non-conventional sources of revenue by undertaking PPP
projects and putting a tab on the excess consumption of fuel.
The KSRTC (Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation), NWKRTC (North West
Karnataka Road Transport Corporation), NEKRTC (North East Karnataka Road
Transport Corporation) which provide public transport in the state are
incurring losses mainly due to their high cost of operations, excess
consumption of fuel and negligible reliance on hired buses, the report
observed.
Recommending the closure of 16 non-working public sector undertakings, the
audit also noticed various deficiencies in the functioning of all 72 working
PSUs (66 companies and six statutory corporations), which employed 1.74 lakh
employees in the state.
The three-year audit reports of the state-run PSUs also pointed out the huge
loss of Rs 549.70 crore incurred by them and also at the infructuous
investments of Rs 392.60 crore made by the state government in these PSUs.
The heavy losses were incurred by three major electricity supply companies
including Bescom (Rs 560.51 crore), Hescom (560.51 crore) and Chescom (Rs
217.15 crore). The major contributors to profit were the Karnataka Power
Corporation (Rs 391.93 crore), Mysore Minerals (Rs 192.42 crore) and The
Hutti Gold Mines Company (Rs 154.09 crore).
“There is greater need for professionalism and accountability in the
functioning of PSUs. They can perform better only if they are financially
self-reliant,” the report said.


More information about the Sustran-discuss mailing list