Hyderabad, Dec 1 : To bail out from the heavy losses incurred by Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC), a proposal for fare hike of 25 paisa per kilometer for ordinary and Palle Velugu bus services and 30 paise per kilometer for express and other services will be submitted to Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao.

Announcing this at a press conference here on Wednesday, Transport Minister Puvvada Ajay Kumar said that the decision of fare hike was taken to reduce the burden on the RTC which was reeling under heavy losses due to increase in diesel prices frequently by the Central Government.

He said that the RTC had suffered losses during the Covid-19 period. The RTC had incurred Rs 4,260 crore losses during the last three years. Fare hike was to some extent to overcome this, he said.

Elaborating the RTC income and expenditure during the last three years, the Minister said that the income of RTC was Rs 4,882 crore during the financial year 2018-19, whereas the expenditure was Rs 5,811 crore. The loss was Rs 919 crore.

Mr Kumar said during the financial year 2019-20, the RTC income was Rs 4,592 crore and the expenditure was Rs 5594 crore. The loss was Rs 1002 crore.

In the fiscal 2020-21, the RTC income was Rs 2,455 crore and the expenditure was Rs 4,784 crore. The loss was Rs 2,329 crore. The RTC would generate about Rs 850 crore with the fare hike, the Minister said.

Quoting a survey report undertaken by the RTC in association with a private firm, the Minister claimed the people were not against fare hike and only 4.3 per cent of people raised objections.

TSRTC Managing Director V C Sajjanar requested the state government to accept the proposal of fare hike.(UNI)