Delhi government plans to extend service life of over 2,600 DTC buses to 15 yrs

The Delhi government is looking to extend the operational life cycle of over 2,600 Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) buses to 15 years as the fleet is ageing. DTC has issued a tender for comprehensive annual maintenance contract for these buses comprising 1,840 non-AC and over 800 AC low-floor units.

The contractor who gets selected post the tender process will be responsible for annual maintenance of these buses with up to 15 years of age from the date of registration, he said. The selected 2,600 DTC buses were purchased between 2008 and 2010 and nearly half of these have already completed 7.5 lakh kilometres, which is their maximum service life.

Recently, Hindustan Times reported that entire fleet of 3,760 DTC buses was officially declared “overage" this year. This is the first such case in the history of the state transport utility, which was set up in 1971, as per data accessed from Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) and analysed by HT.

The report further stated that out of the entire fleet currently in operation, as many as 3,072 buses are 10 to 12 years old while a sizable 656 buses are beyond 12 years of age. In fact, not a single DTC bus is less than six years old. The JNNURM specifies that the maximum operational life of a low-floor CNG bus is 12 years or 750,000km, whichever is later.

Meanwhile, the process to procure 300 electric buses by DTC has been delayed due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and the lockdowns induced due to it. While the first batch was supposed to start operating from October, it has now been delayed to November, and the entire fleet of 300 buses will arrive only by February next year.

DTC is also three months behind its schedule to set up parking space for the e-buses at Mundela Kala, Rajghat and Rohini depots in the state, PTI quoted sources. When they arrive, these buses will be operated by JBM and Tata Motors, who will operate 200 and 100 buses respectively.

(with inputs from PTI)

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