Rationalising the refixation of bus-fare

THE editorial titled 'Anarchy in transport sector' that appeared in The Financial Express on its June 22, '08 issue has befittingly noted the present status of transport sector in Bangladesh. In this respect I would like to note something about the committee that was constituted to evaluate the rationale of demand for fare-hike of the CNG-driven buses. The price per litre of diesel is Tk. 40.00 and after doubling the CNG price recently per cubic meter, it is Tk. 16.75 now, which is less than half of that of diesel. One litre of diesel and one cubic meter of CNG are considered equal power-providers to a motor vehicle. The present government approved earlier the fare of the diesel-driven bus each passenger, per kilometer of distance, Tk. 0.80. This is still in force. But the recently-formed committee recommended Tk. 1.20 for each passenger of CNG driven buses for each kilometer distance and recommended Tk. 5.00 as the minimum fare. The rate is 50 per cent higher than that of diesel-driven bus. The cost of CNG was earlier lower than that of diesel. Diesel-driven buses are being converted to CNG after making investments of more than Tk. 1.5 hundred thousand each to reduce the operational cost.

The diesel-run and CNG-driven buses have the same equipment except CNG kits and cylinders. That is, investments for both kinds of buses are more or less the same. In this situation, how could the government fix the fare of CNG-driven buses at a higher rate than that of diesel-driven ones? It is feared that either the CNG bus owners had befooled the committee or they made 'underhand' deals with it. There is a need for proper investigation by a high-powered government body in this connection in order to find out whether there was any corruption. The issue needs to be reviewed and a rational decision has to be made to balance the interests of the bus passengers and the owners thereof.

Md. Ashraf Hossain

8, Panthapath Bashabo, Dhaka-1215