Bus contractors take AMTS

This came to light after Ahmedabad Municipal Transport Service installed Global Positioning Systems (GPS) in 100 odd buses last year. While elaborating on the issue, a senior member of the AMTS board told TOI that AMTS has been paying the contractors at the rate of Rs 27 per km for every bus against an assurance that they are running each bus for 224km everyday, the fact being that buses run just 160km a day.

Contractors inflated the assured run by 71 per cent and pocketed huge profits. Instead of the Rs 15.76 lakh that AMTS should be paying contractors per year per bus, it was shelling out Rs 22.68 lakh. Till GPS systems were installed, contractors produced books that showed that they were running 224km. But this was not true. The issue was picked up for discussion several times and there was an effort to revise the tender contract terms.

"Since the contract was signed for five years and it was agreed that AMTS would pay for 224km a day, the issue cannot be corrected any sooner. We had signed contracts for 84,000km which comes to 7,000km a month. Instead, buses were clocking 59,000km in a year. At least with the GPS system installed we can sign contracts that are specific to different routes of various buses," says a senior AMC official.

"For the time being we have started awarding tenders at new rates, lower than the old ones, for buses for which the contract period has ended. We are taking corrective measures though we cannot step back from the contract terms and conditions," adds the official.