Commuters to be charged Rs 1,170 per trip; flag off on June 15
Breaking the monopoly of Indo Canadian Transport Company that had been charging hefty fares from NRIs for ferrying them safely to IGI Airport in New Delhi, the Punjab Transport Department is set to start its own Volvo bus service from June 15, shortly after the flagging off ceremony to be held at the Jalandhar bus stand.
As soon as Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann will flag off the bus at 1.15 pm on June 15 from Jalandhar, the services will start simultaneously from other cities like Amritsar, Pathankot, Hoshiarpur, Kapurthala, Ludhiana, Patiala, Ropar and even Chandigarh as well.
However, NRI hub Jalandhar will have a maximum of seven buses plying from here at 7:40 am, 11 am, 1:15 pm, 3:30 pm, 7 pm, 8:30 pm and 11 pm. Amritsar will have three buses at 9 am, 12 noon and 1:40 pm. Likewise, Ludhiana, Hoshiarpur, Pathankot and Kapurthala will have one bus each. Patiala, Ropar and Chandigarh will have two buses each.
While Indo Canadian company charges over Rs 2,850 per trip from Jalandhar to Delhi airport and the bus fare varies according to comfort of the seat, the state buses will charge only Rs 1,170. The officials claim that their charges from all destinations would be less than half of what Indo Canadian had been charging.
They further said the bus service has got a stage carriage permit and hence will be picking passengers en route from designated points as per advance booking. Their fare will be less and not the same as the starting point as the other private company has been doing, said an official.
A team of officials from Transport Department, including Special Secretary (Transport) Pardeep Kumar Sabharwal, and Director (Transport) Amandeep Kaur, on Friday took a round of the bus stand to review the ongoing preparations for the ceremony on June 15.
Sabharwal said people could book their seats for IGI Airport through websites of Punjab Roadways and PUNBUS. They can also book online tickets six months before their journey besides getting manual tickets from the counters at respective bus stands three months before their date of travel.
***********************************************************
Readers
These are extraordinary times. All of us have to rely on high-impact, trustworthy journalism. And this is especially true of the Indian Diaspora. Members of the Indian community overseas cannot be fed with inaccurate news.
Pravasi Samwad is a venture that has no shareholders. It is the result of an impassioned initiative of a handful of Indian journalists spread around the world. We have taken the small step forward with the pledge to provide news with accuracy, free from political and commercial influence. Our aim is to keep you, our readers, informed about developments at ‘home’ and across the world that affect you.
Please help us to keep our journalism independent and free.
In these difficult times, to run a news website requires finances. While every contribution, big or small, will makes a difference, we request our readers to put us in touch with advertisers worldwide. It will be a great help.
For more information: pravasisamwad00@gmail.com