Chief Minister KCR goes ahead with RTC privatisation plan

Hyderabad: Chief Minister, K. Chandrasekhar Rao, is likely to call for a Cabinet meeting in next week to discuss the privatisation of 5,100 Road Transport Corporation (RTC) routes against the backdrop of Telangana High Court paving the way for granting route permits to private stage carriers.

The court ruled that the state government had ample power under the Motor Vehicles Act to grant permits to private stage carriers, but it had a constitutional obligation not to privatise more than 50 per cent of RTC routes.

The court also upheld the decision of the cabinet dated Nov 2, 2019 in which it had resolved to issue permits for 5100 routes of the RTC to private bus operators.

The cabinet also decided to continue the RTC with the private partners at a 50:50 ratio to maintain level play and create healthy competition in public transportation.

After the RTC workers went on strike on Oct 5, the Telangana state road corporation invited applications to hire 2248 private buses for the corporation and it had received around 22,332 applications from private operators. The chief minister decided to call the cabinet to finalise the modalities to grant permits to  private operators and called for applications for permits.