UDAIPUR, August 3 (TIWN): All Tripura Bus Owners Association organized four hours mass demonstrations in Udaipur on Sunday demanding for immediate increase in bus fair. The 9 points charter demonstration started at 11AM in the morning and continued up to 2PM. The demonstration was jointly organized by All Tripura Bus Owners Association and Tripura Bus Syndicate. Among the leaders who remained present on this occasion are Shyamal Sir, South Tripura Bus Owners Association (STBOA) Secretary, Swapan Sarkar, Convenor of South Tripura Bus Syndicate, Haradhan Nandi, President of All Tripura Bus Associaition, Agartala and Adhir Saha, President of Udaipur Bus Syndicate.

 The nine points demands include:-

    1) Increase in passenger fare

    2) Subsidy in increased rate of Petrol from 2012

    3) Consideration regarding the increase in equipments, lubricants and parts.

    4) Efforts to save Bus Industry

 The leaders demanded that in recent years the rate of petrol and diesel increased considerably but state govt is totally oblivious when the question of increasing the passenger fare is raised. They said at present it is really impossible to save bus industry and hundreds of workers involved in this industry. The association threatened that if State Govt and Transport Ministry do not respond to their demands promptly they will create a dead lock in future making even more greater movement.

Meanwhile taking the advantage of this movement small cars like jeeps, Max and private cars simply harassed the thousands of passengers throughout the day. The drivers took double or even more as compared to the normal fare in Agartala-Sabroom-Udaipur-Belonia-Amarpur routes. Having no other alternative the people were forced to pay the extra fare. Interestingly even after knowing this neither traffic or police administration nor Transport Department officials came to the aid of the common people.