KALPETTA: “Some cousins had come down for vacation, and we thought of taking a KSRTC bus trip to Gundlupet. Nowadays, the blooming sunflower fields and vineyards are a trend, and ladies in the family were excited to experience the Priyadarshini ride,” said 29-year-old Mehnas Aboobacker.
Having travelled from Kozhikode to Sultan Bathery on a Wednesday morning with her two-year-old baby, cousins and relatives, Mehnas was eager to reach Karnataka’s scenic farmlands.
“Everyone on social media is talking about the stop near the vineyards, so we had to experience it ourselves.” However, the family’s viral excursion came to an abrupt halt even before leaving the bus station.
Around 150 passengers had crammed into an ordinary bus, rendering it impossible for the vehicle to even start service. The crush eventually required police intervention, with officers stepping in to ask several passengers to alight so the vehicle could proceed.Mehnas’ experience is becoming an everyday reality at the Sultan Bathery depot.
The state government’s Priyadarshini scheme, which provides free KSRTC ordinary bus travel to women, has triggered an unprecedented surge in leisure travel. Driven by viral Instagram reels and social media trends highlighting zero-fare trips to Gundlupet’s sunflower patches and vineyards, daily ordinary services — which usually cost around `180-250 — are bursting at the seams.
Every morning, particularly around the 10:20am trip, travellers from Kozhikode, Kannur and Malappuram stream into Sultan Bathery, filling buses to more than double their design capacity. While leisure travellers embrace the free perk, local commuters who rely on interstate lines for work and essential visits are bearing the brunt of the overcrowding. “It has become almost impossible for us to board the bus at intermediate stops,” explained Santhosh Kammarath, a local commuter.
“The bus gets completely packed right from the Sultan Bathery station itself — often with over 100 passengers squeezed into a vehicle meant for half that capacity. By the time it reaches the mid-route stops, there isn’t an inch of standing space left.”
“Nowadays, the rush of passengers on the 10:20am service has gone out of control. The majority of travellers are women visiting the flower blooms and vineyards of Gundlupet,” a Sultan Bathery KSRTC bus staffer said.
“The situation poses a significant challenge for us,” added Abdul Nazer, assistant transport officer at KSRTC Sultan Bathery depot. “Overcrowding is a major safety concern, especially when operating on older vehicles along forest routes and ghat sections. At the same time, we cannot simply turn away passengers who are eager to travel.”
The staff are worried about the upcoming Onam vacation rush. Some suggest introducing dedicated tourism shuttles or scheduled additional ordinary trips during morning peak hours on the Sultan Bathery-Gundlupet line to absorb the high volume of leisure travellers without disrupting regular transit. Staff emphasise the need for strict terminal passenger flow control, establishing mandatory passenger caps at the origin to end dangerous footboard packing before vehicles depart onto forest roads.