Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu has focused on this issue in the wake of concerns expressed by auto drivers that their livelihood will be affected by the launch of the Stree Shakti (free bus travel for women) scheme. As part of this, he has instructed officials to formulate a new scheme for auto drivers.
While the Stree Shakti scheme is set to start from the 15th of this month, it is not known what the new scheme for auto drivers will be like, what the procedures are, and when the scheme will come into effect. Chandrababu Naidu mentioned the issue of auto drivers in a review meeting held on Tuesday on the free bus scheme.
He inquired about the details of existing central and state schemes for auto drivers and instructed officials to formulate a new scheme in conjunction with central schemes and conduct a comprehensive study for this. The government is to take a decision after the officials complete the study and submit proposals. However, the state government has not set a specific deadline for this.
On the other hand, CM Chandrababu Naidu revealed in this review that the Stree Shakti scheme will be launched at the Pandit Nehru Bus Stand in Vijayawada on the 15th of this month. He wanted to take early steps to ensure that there are no shortcomings in the implementation of this scheme. Since there is a possibility of passenger congestion with the free bus travel scheme, traffic management should be done efficiently.
He wanted to increase capacity accordingly and ensure that no complaints were received anywhere and to take feedback from passengers on the free bus travel from time to time and take the scheme forward with better ideas accordingly. He said that GPS should be enabled for e-POS machines and information should be provided to passengers by tracking them.
Chandrababu said that they should work in conjunction with RTGS and wanted to clean toilets every 2 hours. The CM ordered the officials to set up RO plants for drinking water in all bus stations and complete the repair and painting work of bus stations undertaken at a cost of Rs. 30 crore by December this year. He wants to take steps to ensure that buses do not break down anywhere as additional bus services have to be run to cope with the rush.
