Reported by Dennis Selvan in Timesofindia.indiatimes.com on Jul 4, 2012
More buses than crew in Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation, reveals RTI - The Times of India

TRICHY: In the last decade, 43 people were recruited to the Kumbakonam-based Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) either through court directions or as a result of transfers and 190 employees had superannuated or left service through voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) during the same period. In the administrative side, there were 351 administrative staff in March 2002, and the number has now come down to 204 in March 2012.

These facts came to light revealed in an RTI reply obtained by a CPM trade union leader who told TOI that it was alarming that the number of new buses were increasing in inverse proportion to the number of retirements. "Accidents are waiting to happen because of the government's lethargy in waking up to the sad reality of staff shortage," said N Mani, deputy general secretary of Tamil Nadu Transport Federation and also the president for Trichy region.

The RTI reply also revealed there was no recruitment in the last decade and the number of technicians had come down to 839 now from 1,115 in 2002. On the contrary, the total fleet in TNSTC, Kumbakonam had gone up to 1,192 now from 868 in 2002. Mani said the situation was alarming because there was now a need for at least 2,384 drivers to operate 1192 buses in two shifts. Moreover, each driver was entitled to 52 weekly offs, 30 earned, 18 medical, 10 casual and two restricted holidays. Mani also told confided to TOI that most of the drivers after completing one shift sneaked out without informing, since they were forced to work overtime. "The additional money may be welcome, but it should not be at the cost of a greater risk to life," Mani warned.

Curiously, it is only the AITUC having a strength of about 400 members that is making a big hue and cry about the issue of safety and loss of income. Mani said the majority of the workers did not agitate against this life-threatening work culture because they had suddenly shifted their allegiance from the DMK-dominated Labour Progressive Front (LPF) to the AIADMK-controlled Amma Thozhilalar Peravai (ATP). Before the AIADMK came to power, ATP had a membership of 840, but now the membership has increased to 3,400. Similarly, the LPF had 3,600 members before the general elections, but now it is left with only 800. The trend among the drivers and conductors was to go with the ruling tide to select plum routes.

Thanks to the shortage of drivers and conductors, the normally non-remunerative routes are plied later than their scheduled time in the odd hours making a hole in the revenue pockets. At times, this syndrome paves the way for the 25% local bus operators to make a windfall who ply only on productive routes, Mani explained.