TGRTC to launch electric buses on Karimnagar-JBS route on Sunday

RTC officials have made elaborate arrangements for the launch of electric buses scheduled to be held at Ambedkar stadium here on Sunday

Karimnagar: The stage is set for operation of electric buses in the TGRTC’s Karimnagar region. Initially, 33 electric super luxury buses will be operated between Karimnagar and the Jubilee Bus Station, Hyderabad.

RTC officials have made elaborate arrangements for the launch of electric buses scheduled to be held at Ambedkar stadium here on Sunday.

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Transport Minister Ponnam Prabhakar along with Ministers D Sridhar Babu and N Uttam Kumar Reddy and RTC MD VC Sajjanar will inaugurate buses.

In order to protect the environment as well as reduce fuel burden, TGRTC is introducing electric buses in different routes. As part of its plans, 70 electric buses have been allocated to the Karimnagar region as against request of region authorities’ for 100 buses. Of these, 35 buses have already reached Karimnagar.

Initially, 33 buses will be operated in between Karimnagar-JBS on a gross-cost contract (GCS) system. Two vehicles will be kept on standby. A private firm JBM will operate all these electric buses from Karimnagar-2 depot, which has already been handed over to the private operator.

In this regard, both the private firm and TGRTC have already entered into an agreement. Besides appointing drivers, operation of buses would be done by the private firm while RTC would supply conductors and supervise the operation.

A total of 14 charging points have developed in the depot. Besides laying an 11KV power supply line, three electric transformers were installed.

After getting the entire fleet of 70 vehicles, authorities will operate 39 buses on the Karimnagar-JBS route, nine on Karimnagar-Godavarikhani route, four on Karimnagar-Manthani route, six on the Karimnagar-Kamareddy route, six in Karimnagar-Jagtial and six in Karimnagar-Sircilla routes.

As part of the State government’s decision to operate electric buses under private management, a few depots including Karimnagar-2, Nizamabad, Warangal, Nalgonda, Suryapet and Hyderabad-2 depots have been handed over to private operators, RTC sources said.