Integrated board for CSTC, CTC and WBSTC constituted

It may be recalled that World Bank has funded a project to rationalise routes in different areas. It has been found that in many places there were more buses and less commuters, while in other areas the ratio between the users and the vehicles are disproportionate.

Route rationalisation will help the commuters and bring down loss incurred by the various transport corporations.Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that the purpose of bringing in integrated board is to bring down the expenditure. The state government needs to pay Rs 40,000 crore to clear debt.

Thus, such a step has been taken to ensure that common people continue getting better transport facility and at the same time the expenditure also comes down.

She said that there is no reason for the employees of any of the three corporations to worry. In case there is any excess in man power, they can be transferred to some other departments.Chairman of the integrated board for CSTC, CTC and WBSTC is MLA Rachpal Singh and the vice-chairman is Swarnakamal Saha, who is known for his wide experience in the transport sector.

 Nayana Bandyapadhyay and Sujit Basu, MLAs from Chowringhee Assembly constituency and Bidhannagar Assembly constituency respectively are the two directors of the integrated board.

The boards of the North Bengal State Transport Corporation (NBSTC) and South Bengal State Transport Corporation (SBSTC) have also been reconstituted on Wednesday. MLA Sourav Chakraborty is continuing as the chairman of the board for NBSTC and Arghya Ray Pradhan has become its vice-chairman.

Tamanash Ghosh is the chairman of the board for SBSTC and Asit Majumder is its vice-chairman.

There are five directors in the board for NBSTC and four in SBSTC.Explaining the reason behind setting up an integrated board for the three corporations whose functions are mainly related to the city, a senior official of the state transport department said that this is the first step towards bringing all the three corporations under one umbrella.

He said that a study that was undertaken in 2013-14 had revealed that there are many routes where almost all the three corporations run buses and it is resulting to a loss both financially as well as in terms of workforce.

The integration will help in depot and terminus sharing and the corporations would stop incurring loss.

This has been initially started in the city and gradually it may also happen in the entire state, said the official.