The Hindu : New Delhi News : High Capacity Bus system faces roadblocks

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 08, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

High Capacity Bus system faces roadblocks

By Sujay Mehdudia

NEW DELHI, FEB. 7. The Sheila Dikshit Government's dream of putting in place an efficient multi-modal transport system seems to have run into rough weather. The much-touted Operating Urban Transport Plan for Delhi has gone haywire putting a question mark over the future of various projects. The hardest hit has been the High Capacity Bus System that has not only faced a step-motherly treatment from the Delhi Government, but its implementation is also running years behind schedule.

Making a mockery of deadlines and its commitment to improve the public transport system, the Delhi Government has nothing to present on this front except for the Metro Rail project that is progressing smoothly due to non-interference by the Government and its bureaucrats. Experts are also sceptical about the ability of the Delhi Government to deliver and are peeved over the ad hoc approach being adopted by the Delhi Government in implementation of the transport sector- related projects. The latest instance of bureaucratic lethargy is the High Capacity Bus System that has just failed to take off. Conceived originally by the former Transport Minister and now New Delhi Member of Parliament, Ajay Maken, the project has run into one obstacle after another ever since his departure from the Delhi Government. Despite repeated assertions by his successor, Haroon Yusuf, that everything was fine with the project, things are in a state of suspended animation with the pilot project still to get off the ground despite financial clearance months ago.

Despite repeated pleas by experts, the Delhi Government is yet to form the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for implementation of the project. Not only this, experts are of the view that instead of working in a ad hoc manner and taking up work on a small stretch, the Government should go all out on implementation of the High Capacity Bus System and related matters. The Supreme Court- appointed Environmental Pollution (Prevention) Control Authority (EPCA) has also suggested that full system (98-km five corridors of HSBC, 32-km two corridors of light rail and second phase of Metro Rail) should be made operational by 2007. This is a tight deadline but could be done if a mechanism is put into place. The scale of the public transport system must match the scale of Delhi and the scale of the problem.

Status: The Delhi Government has still not responded to the EPCA report. Top expert and the brain behind the High Capacity Bus System, Dinesh Mohan of the IIT, Delhi, said starting work on all the routes of High Capacity Bus System would be an ideal situation. Prof. Mohan informed that work on the pilot project from Ambedkar Nagar to Mool Chand would begin very soon as tenders had been floated for the same. The Government is already considering floating of a SPV and the Delhi Cabinet has to take a decision in this regard.

However, the scenario looks bleak, as some of the High Capacity Buses that had been bought by the Government last year are lying unused. The Government has ordered another six such buses without the actual tracks for plying them being in place. "There is total lack of commitment to carry on with the transport related projects. This is not going to help the cause of the Government. Relying only on the Metro Rail will prove disastrous for the Capital as well as the people in the long run. Clearly the Government is going very slow and there is hardly any movement visible on the transport front,'' a senior official remarked.

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