Over 100 of the 1,020 school buses in the district were found with minor faults during an inspection carried out by the Regional Transport Officials of Vellore and Ranipet region and notices were issued to them by the authorities on Thursday.
Vellore Regional Transport Officer (RTO) Pon Senthilnathan said the Vellore office comprised Vellore, Katpadi, Gudiyattam, Ambur, Vaniyambadi and Tirupattur taluks and more than 725 school buses ply in these areas. As many as 299 school buses come under the Ranipet RTO which comprised Arcot, Walajah and Arakkonam taluks.
Notices have been issued to around 40 buses of the total 361 buses from Vellore and Katpadi, while 9 buses out of 113 in Gudiyattam branch office and 20 buses out of the 255 buses in Vaniyambadi branch office were found to be faulty.
Senthilnathan said the inspection of school buses began druing the first week of June, before schools reopened. He said,“Most of the school vehicles were in order and only minor faults were found, such as presence of only one fire extinguisher instead of two, drugs in the first aid box and improper window grills.”
“The authorities of the schools to which the faulty buses belonged were issued notices and warned not to operate them until the faults were fixed and approval was obtained from the RTO, within seven days from the date of issue of the notice,” he added.
Ranipet Regional Transport Officer K Mohan said of the total 299 buses, more than 275 buses were inspected and notices were issued to 31 buses. He said the new feature that was being looked for was the presence of emergency exits at the extreme rear right side.
The new rule was introduced in the Tamil Nadu Motor Vehicles (Regulation and Control of School Buses) Special Rules 2012.