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Tirupati: RTC fare hike hits pilgrims hard
RTC says bus operation in ghat road is expensive compared to plain area services due to consumption of more fuel and wear and tear which is more for ghat road services.
Tirupati: The hike in RTC fare which comes into force from Wednesday, will hit the pilgrims hard as the bus fare to Tirumala is increased about 18 per cent.
The bus fare to Tirumala, which is now Rs 55, has been increased to Rs 65, while the up and down ticket fare is increased from Rs 100 to 120. The RTC is the major transporter for the pilgrims arriving from various places to Tirumala for darshan of Lord Venkateswara.
APSRTC, Tirupati region has 520 buses for ghat road service operating 2,500-3,000 trips daily ferrying not less than about 45,000 pilgrims on normal days which will go up on weekends and special occasions like festivals and religious celebrations.
As part of the state-wide hike in RTC fares, the bus charges for busses operating between Tirupati and Tirumala also increased affecting thousands of passengers on a pilgrimage to Tirumala.
The burden of fare increase affected other sections like students, employees and the general public too as concessional student pass, season tickets and the daily 'Travel As You Like' tickets were also steeply increased.
According RTC sources, due to the fare increase, the travel from here in Super Luxury bus to Hyderabad will cost Rs 115 more, to Vijayawada Rs 79 and Bengaluru Rs 40 more. Similarly, the bus fare in AC Amaravati and Garuda bus services were also increased Rs 150 more.
In fact, the bus fare of Tirumala-Tirupati buses is on the higher side as the RTC fixed the fare which is higher than the charges of buses operating in other areas as the ghat road bus operation is expensive compared to plain area services due to consumption of
more fuel and wear and tear which is more for ghat road bus service. Following the hike that came into effect from the zero hour of Wednesday, RTC authorities painted the hiked fare, displaying it on ghat road buses and also in the counters at all bus stations from where Tirumala buses area being operated here.
It is needless to say that many pilgrims more so from other state were surprised at the steep increase of the bus fare and the staff at the counters struggled hard to convince them and some of them resenting the hike arguing heatedly with the staff.
Kannan, a pilgrim from Salam in Tamil Nadu, said the hike would hit more the common pilgrims as a family of four, like his family has to spend about Rs 100 more due to increase in RTC fare.
Raghu, a pilgrim from Venkatagiri, who also echoed the same opinion and wanted the government to reconsider hike particularly Tirumala buses keeping in view thousands of pilgrims.
