BEST may hike bus fare, Budget '18-'19

 15 Oct 2017  552
10 october 2017

seniour correspondant, mumbai

The BEST will present its budget for next fiscal year on Tuesday, and sources indicate that the transport undertaking may propose a hike in 
busfares. Also, the losses for transport wing could be projected as more than Rs 1,000 crore for 2018-19.

"There is a possibility of the BEST proposing a fare hike for distances above 6 km--ranging from Re 1 to Rs 12--depending on the distance travelled," a source from the undertaking said.

Sources said the BEST may also highlight in its budget that annual losses in the transport wing will rise by nearly 30% this fiscal year, from Rs 990 crore to Rs 1,283 crore in 2017-18, if proper measures were not undertaken.

The fiscal losses could further escalate to Rs 1,419 crore annually in 2018-19, as per projections made by officials, the sources stated.
The transport body is already grappling with a Rs 590crore deficit budget for 2017 18. In fact, this budget is yet to be cleared by the BMC House.It could perhaps be for the first time that BEST may get clearance for two fiscal budgets from the civic House simultaneously.
The budget will be presented on Tuesday , and the discussions will be held post-Divali, sources said.

The BEST undertaking may also point out a series of reforms to be undertaken to bring the transport body out of the red. These include wet-leasing buses, cutting down on manpower among other things. BEST officials had recently adopted a new strategy to rake in more revenue and woo commuters.They have a trade-off between "dissatisfied" commuters, who are unhappy with some of the services being withdrawn recently, and the "satisfied" commuters, who are getting more buses than normal, An official said that the undertaking was not shutting down any of the 480 existing routes.