Dinesh Kamath's news 'Police protection for NMMT buses now' that was published in Newsband

Police protection for NMMT buses now

By Dinesh Kamath

NAVI MUMBAI: Navi Mumbai Municipal Transport has started a new bus route from Khandeshwar railway station to Vichumbe bridge, New Panvel. The special feature of this bus service is that it has police protection. The reason for having police protection was the two attacks on the bus crew that happened ever since the services started.

The other new bus services which are enjoying police protection are the ones from Mansarovar and Khandeshwar railway station. NMMT has done yeomen service to the public by introducing bus service from Mansarovar to police headquarters in Kalamboli, further extending it to Roadpalli.

The auto operators, in order to give a boost to their business, pressurize the NMMT bus crews to cause problems to the commuters so that they are forced to avail the services of autos. Somehow, the NMMT bus crews bow down to the pressure. The losers are the commuters who are troubled by both NMMT bus services as well as the menace caused by auto operators. There were certain buses which would take off every 10 minutes initially but the moment the auto operators managed to apply pressure on the NMMT bus crews, the buses stopped taking off every 10 minutes and began providing a staggered service thus forcing the commuters to be at the mercy of auto operators.

Such incidents keep occurring in spite of RTO having taken strict action against errant operators time and again. In fact, the RTO had even gone to the extent of seizing the vehicles. But the menace continues to persist thus putting nobody else but the commuters in a soup.