MTC to auction last three AC buses in its fleet

The abandoned buses were auctioned at the MTC Central Workshop in Chrompet. The lone bus which was plying between T Nagar and Kelambakkam was pulled out last month.

“A tender was floated to auction all the air-conditioned vehicles. Except for three, all the other vehicles were auctioned last Sunday. We will be done with the rest before this week. Usually, the resale value of an ordinary bus at these auctions is nearly Rs 1.5 lakh. I suppose that the resale value of air-conditioned buses will be approximately Rs 2 lakh or above,” a top official said.

“We will miss travelling on the Volvo. For the first few years, we had a pleasant experience commuting in the air-conditioned vehicles. After that, they became a nightmare following vehicles developing frequent mechanical failures,” said a commuter.

Each air-conditioned bus was purchased from the manufacturer at a cost Rs 80 lakhs. The MTC procured nearly 10 buses on a pilot basis in 2008. In three years, the Corporation added 100 more air-conditioned buses to its fleet. Around 50 vehicles were under the maintenance of Adyar bus depot and the rest under Anna Nagar bus depot. In the last year alone, 13 vehicles were pulled out from the fleet.

Refusing to quote the revenue generated from the auction, the managing director of the MTC, Anbu Abraham, said, “The resale value of buses is relatively low. But these vehicles have reached its expiry date. Extending its operations pose a grave danger to the commuters and road users.”