THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Following the intervention of Transport Minister AK Saseendran, private bus operators withdrew their indefinite strike from Wednesday. The minister had requested the bus operators to withdraw the strike to avoid troubling students during their exams.
Private bus owners are demanding a revision of the minimum fare from Rs 8 to Rs 10. They also want to fix the minimum charge for students at Rs 5.
The government constituted the Justice Ramachandran Committee to study the demands for fare revision in February. The Transport Minister was of the opinion that he could not make a sudden announcement of fare revision. “The fare revision committee is holding talks with various stakeholders. We have been very considerate to the demands of bus operators,” said the minister.
The joint protest council in a statement said it had decided to postpone the strike after it was learned that the Justice Ramachandran Committee had scheduled a hearing on the issue with the student's union on
March 17. “The ongoing SSLC examinations is also a reason why we postponed our strike,” said the chairman of the Kerala State Private Bus Operators Federation, Lawrence Babu.
This is the third time in two months that the joint protest committee of three prominent organisations decided to postpone the strike on the Transport Minister's intervention. Earlier, the strikes were announced
on February 4 and February 21.