Bengaluru, June 20: Transport Minister DC Thammanna said that the state government is planning to give permission to purchase new cars to only those who have parking space.

Speaking to reporters at the Vidhana Soudha here on Wednesday, he said that the government has planned to control the purchase of diesel cars. As the first step, steps were taken to reduce the registration of new diesel cars. The department would start campaigns to use community transport system to ease traffic congestion. He would shortly submit a proposal to the Urban Development Department to develop roads, he said.

No bus fare hike

The department meeting would be held under the chairmanship of the Chief Minister on June 27 and 28 wherein budget issues would be discussed. Issues like hiking bus fares including BMTC would also be discussed. As of now, there is no proposal to hike bus fare. But steps would be taken to compensate the losses, he clarified.

Free bus pass

Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy would shortly announce on giving free bus passes to all students irrespective of any categories on the line of SC/ST students. The government has already decided to issue free bus passes 19.6 lakh students including SC/ST categories. In the Congress government, then chief minister Siddaramaiah had announced free bus passes. But the Finance department did not approve the proposal. But he has discussed with the Chief Minister now and the latter has agreed ‘in –principle’ to issue free bus passes, the Minister said.

The free bus passes to SC/ST students would cost Rs 114 crore to the state Exchequer and the Social Welfare Department would bear that cost. In the same way, the department would re quire Rs 629 crore to give free bus passes to backward classes and general category students. As per the existing norms, out of the total cost, the government should bear 50 per cent, KSRTC 25 per cent and the beneficiary 25 per cent cost. For free bus pass, students need not pay anything. Now, it is the question of this 25 per cent amount. If either the Education department or the government provided that amount, the department is ready to issue free bus passes, he said.

“If we want to control the private bus operators menace in the state including Dakshina Kannada, Udupi and other districts, all routes should be nationalized. It is impossible task as of now. The system should be corruption-free right from the bottom to top. I have already directed the authorities to check corruption wherever it is possible”.

- DC Thammanna, Transport Minister



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Vilnius (AP/PTI): A DHL cargo plane crashed Monday morning near the Lithuanian capital.

The Lithuanian airport authority identified the aircraft as a “DHL cargo plane flying from Leipzig, Germany, to Vilnius Airport.”

It posted on the social platform X that city services including a fire truck were on site.

DHL Group, headquartered in Bonn, Germany, did not immediately return a call for comment.