No extension of permits to blueline buses

New Delhi: The Delhi government has welcomed a High Court decision of refusing the extension of permits to the blueline buses, saying the judgement vindicated its stand on the issue.

"We whole-heartedly welcome the verdict. It vindicated our position on the issue. The court supported our position," Delhi Transport Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely said.

The Delhi High Court on Thursday refused to extend the permits of these buses after their expiry, saying the right to life of road-users is more important than the right to livelihood of operators of the buses.

"The fundamental right to life takes precedence over all statutory rights. The right to livelihood of the blueline bus operators, numbering a few hundred, would have to be subservient to the larger public interest of the safety to other road users," said a division bench of Justice A K Sikri and Justice Suresh Kait.

Last year, Delhi Government had decided to completely phase out the blueline fleet, which gained notoriety for frequent accidents, from the city by January 31 this year.

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The government had already removed around 1,600 blueline buses from the city out of around 2,000 buses.

While pronouncing the order, the High Court, however, allowed 328 blueline buses, which are plying on various routes, to continue the service till the expiry of their permits by June 2012.

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Lovely said DTC now has 6,500 buses including nearly 4,000 low-floor buses and the fleet will be able to meet the transport requirement of the city.

"We will also launch the cluster service soon which will provide lot of option to the commuters," he said.

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The government had last year announced an ambitious cluster bus service scheme under which corporate entities were proposed to be given certain routes in the city on the pattern of cities like Paris and London.

Already five clusters have been allocated to private entities and the first such service is expected to begin its operation by April in South Delhi.

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The government had divided nearly 650 bus routes across the city into 17 clusters, each comprising profitable and non-profitable routes and decided to give each cluster to a private operator.

As per the plan finalised by Delhi Integrated Multimodal Transit System (DIMTS), the transport department will finalise the bus fares which will go to the government while the private operator will be paid a fixed amount on the basis of every kilometre travelled.

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