BENGALURU: Navigating on the congested and crater-ridden roads of Bengaluru seems to be less stressful for Bangalore Metropolit an
Transport Corporation
(
BMTC
)
employees
than going through the rigmarole of obtaining
retirement
benefits from the cash-strapped utility.
Sample this: A whopping 50% of those who retired from BMTC in 2016-17 are yet to get their gratuity and leave encashment.
“It has been more than a year since I retired. All that we are being told is that the transport corporation does not have the money to pay what is rightfully ours,” said a former BMTC employee who did not want to identify himself. Only 277 of the 527 employees (including drivers, conductors and mechanics) who retired between April 2016 and December 2017 have got their gratuity and leave encashment so far.
With the wait for retirement benefits getting longer, anxiety is growing among retirees and those in service.
Transport minister D C Thammanna, while admitting to non-payment of retirement benefits, said: “BMTC’s financial condition is quite bad, so much so that there is a shortage of working capital too. We are working towards stabilising the situation and the retirement benefits will be cleared based on availability of funds.”
Official sources said BMTC has been incurring losses to the tune of Rs 30 crore per month. The corporation admits spending 54% of its earnings on staff salaries, including pension, and the amount runs up to Rs 108 crore. BMTC’s average monthly expenditure is Rs 200 crore.
“Due to increased dearness allowance, we pay higher than all other public transport companies in the country. The salary burden is more than half the cost and we have not even increased our fares for the last four years. We are in the process of clearing dues of retired employees and this is being done every month,” said an official.
Although BMTC maintains the highest standards of bus and employee ratio (1:5.8), it is paying heavily for it. The corporation has 6,783 buses and 34,076 employees.
This apart, the four corporations — KSRTC, BMTC, NE and NWKSRTC — too have availed loans to the tune of Rs 804 crore. In 2017-18, it incurred a loss of Rs 217 crore.
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