Mumbai: Furore as BEST decides to rent its drivers to govt babus

In a decision that has angered a trade union the BEST Undertaking has decided to rent out its skilled bus drivers at Rs 900 per day Following the leak of an internal letter on the issue the trade union has threatened to launch a major protest to ldquostop the injusticerdquo BEST chairman Ashish Chemburkar said that it was for the benefit of drivers and will be done with cautionThis is madness We will be taking out a major demonstration across bus depots in Mumbai on October 12 and following this the protests will be intensified We will not back outrdquo BEST Workersrsquo Union leader Shashank Sharad Rao saidldquoIn a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the trade union and the then municipal commissioner in 2019 the BEST undertaking was expected to maintain a fleet of 3337 selfowned buses The BMC was expected to release money to buy new buses for those scrapped but the BEST committee has not sent any such proposal as a reminder to the civic body Due to this the BESTrsquos own fleet has come down to 1800 buses the rest being on lease which is unfairrdquo Rao saidldquoAs per traditional practice the BEST transport wing has maintained a ratio of 19 for buses which means nine employees per bus including maintenance and other staff With 23000 employees and bus numbers coming down to 1800 there are about 7500 employees that now seem excess who will possibly be rented out now No political party pays attention to BEST workersrsquo genuine issues and now it has become a matter of existence for the Undertakingrdquo he added Of the 7500 employees 6000 are driversThe BEST has a fleet of over 3000 plus buses but most are wet leased File picSatej ShindelsquoBest we can dorsquoBEST Chairman Chemburkar however said it was not right to criticise the decision ldquoThese employees are sitting at bus depots without work and instead of giving them odd jobs the Undertaking has decided to make use of them as per their skill A number of government and semigovernment organisations private entities require skilled drivers Our trained personnel will be offered to them as per shift timings with no additional loads I will ensure that they will not be misused or overloaded with work But this is the best we can do to keep the revenue going and help the driversrdquo he told middayThe BEST has a fleet of over 3000 plus buses but most are wet leased The wet leased buses come with their own driving staff and maintenance responsibilities This renders the BEST depots and staff uselessAs per guidelines of the proposal drawn up by the BEST the plan is to maximise the use of existing staff and they will be sent on hire only on stipulated conditionsldquoSince they will remain BEST employees the staff sent on deputation will maintain all the rights of filing appeal and other legal processes as a regular employee has If leased bus staff is sent on deputation they would be given charges as the respective contract with their firmsrdquo the plan saidTransport expert speakldquoWhen wet leasing of buses was accepted I knew some such move would come What do you do with excess manpower MTNLBSNL did not have much problem as most of their manpower was old over 50 yrs so they could be given VRS In our country when we want to create more jobs having such schemes which make your manpower redundant is not a correct steprdquo AV Shenoy senior transport expert Mumbai Mobility Forum and Mumbai Vikas Samiti saidRs 900The proposed charge for hiring a BEST driverBEST budget The BEST Undertaking on Friday presented a deficit budget of Rs 223648 crore while providing an outlay of Rs 69518 crore for capital expenditure for the fiscal 202223 However BEST has lined up several measures to improve working and get more revenue Amenities listed in the budget document include plans to convert its entire fleet into electric buses by 2027 with electric charging points at 55 places in the metropolis As reported by midday about 1900 fully electric buses will be inducted and will make up for 50 per cent of BESTrsquos fleet by 2023 Of these 1400 will be 12metre AC electric buses 400 will be 9metre AC electric buses and 100 will be miniAC electric buses