To reduce commuter inconvenience and maintain essential services, the Chandigarh Transport Undertaking (CTU) deployed 24 replacement buses on the affected routes after the walkout of 40 electric bus drivers.
The Chandigarh City Bus Services Society, in the name of the CTU, had entered into a gross cost contract mode for 40 electric buses with Ashok Leyland. While the company had to provide the buses and drivers, the CTU was supposed to put its conductors on board. The drivers of the Ashok Leyland buses that CTU hired per kilometer, however, went on strike due to internal issues with its parent company.
The CTU, being the Central Transport Union, issued an official statement highlighting the point that the CTU administration responded quickly to the surprise strike that left most people in the dark. To ensure that public transport services ran uninterrupted and were not subjected to serious disruption, the administration responded quickly in terms of corrective action. To prevent any possible inconvenience or irritation to commuters and to ensure that essential transport services continued to operate smoothly, 24 spare buses were successfully utilized to operate the affected routes.
Furthermore, the CTU, or City Transport Unit, has also gone public with a statement that Ashok Leyland will definitely be penalized as per the agreement provisions, very much due to the public inconvenience and the consequential suspension of service that has ensued. Of importance is that at present there are six specific city routes on which the electric buses run by Ashok Leyland are actually plied.