Nagpur: In the wake of frequent incidents of Aapli Buses catching fire, former Corporator Ved Prakash Arya has demanded the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) to terminate the contract of three operators of city buses and also cancel agreement with DIMTS.
Arya said, NMC should take over operation of city buses and avoid playing with the lives of citizens. The repeated incidents of fire indicate sub-standard maintenance of city buses and lack of supervision on part of DIMTS. “What is the use of spending Rs 100 crore if buses are getting gutted,” he asked while submitting a memorandum to Ram Joshi, Additional Municipal Commissioner, on Friday.
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Thursday 07 Nov. 2024
NMC favours third party probe:
Rattled by repeated incidents of fire in city buses, the Transport Department of NMC, is going to rope in experts for an in-depth study to find out reasons that resulted in gutting of the public property. During the past two months, three Aapli buses in the fleet were gutted due to the fire. Incidentally, these buses were en route when flames started emanating, forcing passengers to save their lives. Fortunately, there was neither any injury nor any casualty in the incidents of fire as most of the time the drivers were alert and stopped the buses in the nick of time before the flames could spread further.
However, for the travellers, it was a lucky escape every time. A slight delay in stopping the bus could have proved dangerous. The first incident occurred wherein the bus caught fire on Gittikhadan Road, next to Takli Headquarters of City Police in April. Within the next fortnight, another bus was gutted and this time the vehicle was near Medical College Square. The third incident is fresh. It happened at Samvidhan Square on May 5.
There was general speculation that the prevailing heat wave might have been the trigger for the incidents of fire in these buses. However, the same was ruled out as primary observation is that of electric short circuit in the engines of respective buses. In all the three buses the flames started from the engine side. The Fire Brigade personnel too have not been able to pinpoint the exact reason for the fires while answering a query. The most probable cause derived by fire brigade officers is suspected electrical short circuits that might have triggered the fire that went onto devour the entire bus in the three incidents. As the interior of any bus is full of flammable material, it did not take for the flames to spread and damage the entire frame.
Meanwhile taking note of the incidents of fire, officials of Regional Transport Office (RTO) held talks with civic body officials to take stock of the arrangements as to maintenance of the buses. Representatives of the three operators and DIMTS, the supervisory agency, were also present during the interaction.
According to reports, the RTO officials also hinted at possible problems with blending of diesel for the incidents of fire in city buses. The diesel is procured by respective operators and NMC has issued instructions to ensure strict quality check. A special attention be paid to wiring and in case of any open loop the same should be insulated with proper tape. But ultimately all these are mere speculations and hence experts in probing fire incidents could help in resolving the mystery.
