Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

KSRTC suffers Rs. 3-crore loss; inter-State services cancelled

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Although the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSTRC) was fully geared to operate its services on Friday, the corporation could not operate the services as per schedule owing to lack of patronage from the travelling public.

The normally busy central bus station at Thampanoor, the main bus station at East Fort and bus stops in the capital remain deserted. ‘We operated skeletal services and was ready to commence full-fledged operations. In some buses, there was only one commuter. The corporation had to spend Rs.12 per km for diesel alone’, he said.

The corporation had to withdraw the inter-State services to Tamil Nadu and Karnataka as a precautionary measure from Thursday midnight in view of the 24-hour hartal in these States.

The KSRTC suffered a loss of Rs.3 crores on Friday as it could not operate the full-fledged services in the state in view of the dawn to dusk hartal called by the BJP. Three BJP activists who tried to block the KSRTC bus were arrested at Balaramapuram.

On an average, KSRTC operates 4,250 schedules in the State. In the capital, the KSRTC operates around 410 schedules. However, the corporation was able to save Rs.75 lakh towards the cost of diesel as it did not operate full services on Friday. Services, including long distance and inter-State services started depots when the hartal came to an end at 6 p.m.

The 110-odd private buses in the capital also did not ply. Since the peak tourist season has come to end in the State, there were not much tourists in the beach resort of Kovalam and Varkala.

The flights from Thiruvananthapuram international airport took off as per schedule, Airports Authority of India sources said.

The police had provided two vans to transport the stranded passengers on the request of the AAI.

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