MUMBAI: When the wet lease system was adopted by BEST to reduce its capital expenditure, operators were supposed to bring their own bus fleet and drivers. Over the last few weeks, however, the entire purpose seems to have been defeated, with BEST supplying drivers on its payroll to wet-lease operators facing a shortage.
Recent data compiled by BEST on its staff strength in the transport wing states that while the desired strength is 3,021 drivers, it has 7,100 employed drivers and an excess of 1,365 posts. Sources in BEST said that the drivers worked chiefly in two to three shifts of seven to eight hours each.
“Ideally, we do not need so many drivers in the system, considering our owned bus fleet of 600-odd,” said a BEST official. “So we are sending our drivers to the wet-lease bus operators facing a driver crunch. But we have informed the operators that they have to make the necessary arrangements to maintain their staff strength.” BEST pays ₹60 to ₹80 per km to wet-lease bus operators to run their fleet.
BEST drivers are paid around ₹1,200 per eight-hour shift apart from their salaries. The wet lease drivers are paid anywhere between ₹16,000 and ₹24,000 depending on the operator and the driver’s years of experience and driving history. Senior BEST officials said that the BEST driver option was beneficial for the wet-lease operators as instead of appointing new drivers on their payroll, they could pay them for their shifts a few days in a month.
On an average, six to 10 wet-lease drivers across all 27 depots are absent daily because of being on official leave, medical leave and so on. BEST is then forced to send its excess drivers on duty to the wet-lease buses. This is to ensure that there are enough buses on the road, as passengers wait for a long 30 to 40 minutes due to the depleted bus fleet.
“We definitely have a dearth of drivers,” said an official from Olectra Greentech, a wet-lease operator and bus manufacturer. “The biggest problem is that we are not getting quality drivers within the state and cannot hire drivers from other states so easily. But we are working towards filling up the vacancies. We also remain committed to supplying buses as per BEST’s schedule.” So far, Olectra has delivered 578 buses, with 30 more expected by the end of the month. The company has a contract to supply 2,100 air-conditioned single-decker e-buses to BEST.
All these months, BEST has been fighting with the bus manufacturers to manufacture and supply new buses periodically and maintain the schedule. This, however, has not come to pass. As per the latest figures, BEST has 2,675 buses, a figure that is even lower than the 2,758 buses it had in the first week of May. Sources said that BEST had barely 600-odd owned buses while the rest belonged to the wet-lease operators.
Mahesh Babu, CEO of Switch Mobility, which was supposed to manufacture and supply 200 AC double-decker e-buses to BEST, said, “Switch Mobility has already successfully delivered 50 double-deckers to BEST that are fully operational. However, a regulatory change was implemented by the Government of India in April 2023 for the Electronic Vehicle Stability Control System (EVSC). This regulatory change requires significant modifications in product development and homologation, which in turn, has increased the overall cost of manufacturing and operations. As per the tender agreement terms, if there is any change in the product specifications, Original Equipment Manufacturers are permitted to approach the authority to request amendments. We have formally notified BEST of this situation and requested a new tender with new specifications meeting the revised homologation requirement.”