KOCHI: The crisis-ridden KSRTC can look forward to better days only if the trade unions here, who now control and manage the corporation, stop interfering in its administration and allow professionally competent people to lead the corporation. Trade unions in every organisation are meant for the welfare of employees and the task of managements is to run the organisation.
ALSO READ: KSRTC, an epitome of inefficiency
KSRTC is the only corporation in the state whose director board has equal number of trade unions and qualified officers. There are as many as 12 nominated trade union members and 12 qualified higher officials, who mostly skip board meetings. Therefore, more than half of the issues facing the corporation can be resolved only when qualified officers take charge of the administration, which means the management should be totally apolitical. This is one of the recommendations of the report by professor Sushil Khanna appointed by the Left government to study the issues confronting the KSRTC and recommend measures for streamlining the corporation.
Another important recommendation made by professor Khanna, which should be implemented at the earliest, is the need to slash employee numbers to overcome the financial crisis plaguing the corporation. The current average of 7.2 employees per bus should be brought down to the national average of 5.2, as per the report.
Since the government has assumed full responsibility to disburse the pension amount for retired employees, it’s not a difficult task to provide the employees’ salary with the help of corporation’s revenue and the `20 crore grant given by the government.If I could disburse the employees’ salary on time from the KSRTC’s own revenue during the 10 months of my tenure, I don’t think it’s a difficult task for others to accomplish it.