VIJAYAWADA: Reeling under acute financial crisis, the Andhra Pradesh State Transport Corporation (APSRTC) is pinning hopes on getting enough funds in the State Budget for the 2017-18 fiscal to be presented on March 6.
According to RTC officials, proposals have been sent to the state government seeking an allotment of Rs 800 crore in the budget to the cash-strapped RTC.
Of the total, Rs 300 crore was listed for purchasing new 2,000 buses and Rs 495 crore for the annual reimbursement amount of the corporation.
At present, the AP SRTC has debts of Rs 2,750 crore -- Rs 1,900 crore was taken as loan from various banks and the remaining from other financial institutes.
In fact, the corporation is paying Rs 300 crore per year as interest to various banks.
Though the corporation had decided to generate revenue from its own land bank, lack of investment has put a roadblock to the ambitious plans.
A few months ago, the RTC has appealed to the State government to stand guarantee for availing a loan of Rs 1,050 crore from HUDCO to meet its financial needs. But there was no response from the government.
"The diesel price hike has hit the corporation hard. Despite the fuel price hike and losses, the RTC did not bring any fare revision. Alternative measures should be explored to create sources of additional revenue generation," said Y Venkateswara Rao, deputy general secretary, APSRTC employees union.
He also pointed out that the corporation is generating a revenue of Rs 1,435 crore every year for the State government in the form of VAT through the purchase of diesel and through Central Excise Duty through the purchase of new buses.
"The Central and State governments should invest a capital amount every year to the RTC as it was the only leading public transport in the country functioning without any profit or loss," Rao demanded.
Though the physical parameters of the RTC are good, the financial parameters are worrying the corporation over the years.
In 2006-07, the government in united AP held talks with Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Bangalore to save the corporation from financial crisis.
A committee of IIM professors studied the causes of loss. In their report, the professors suggested the state government to invest Rs 250 crore every year as capital infuse for three years. But the government failed to invest the equity on RTC, pushing it into a financial crisis.
''Recently, vice-chairman and managing director M Malakondaiah has appealed the State government to allow RTC to make use the services of professor Ravi Kumar, IIM Bangalore, to bail the corporation out of the crisis. A decision in this regard was yet to be taken by the State government," said a senior RTC official, on condition of anonymity.
