Hyderabad: Protesting against the Road Transport and Safety Bill 2015, all road transport workers have gone on strike from midnight of Wednesday. Various trade unions, including All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), HMS INTUC, BMS and others, have extended their support to the 24 hour strike.

Following this, the two Telugu speaking states, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, are bracing up for making alternate arrangement to mitigate the problems of the commuters. Even auto rickshaws in Hyderabad and Secunderabad will be off the roads. As this would put additional pressure on the RTC which has decided not to go on strike though the bill is expected to end the monopoly of state owned public sector transport corporations.

According RTC employee union leaders, they have decided not to go on strike as they had served notice to go on indefinite strike from May 6 demanding 43 percent hike in their salaries. However, the employees would be holding protest meetings at various bus depots in both the states. According to RTC Joint Managing Director G V Ramana Rao arrangements were being made to mitigate the problems of the commuters to the extent possible.

He said the corporation would run additional buses on various routes depending upon the demand. It may be mentioned that the transport bandh has been called against the Road Transport and Safety Bill 2015 which is likely to be introduced in the current budget session of Parliament. Public carriages and private transport across the two Telugu states will be off the road.

The transport operators are peeved over the stringent provisions in the proposed bill. Lorry Owners Association and the auto rickshaw unions in Hyderabad said that while the proposal to bring a uniform Registration Certificate (RC) and driving license system in the country may be desirable, but the penalties and severe prison terms envisaged in the Bill are harmful to the sector. If the severe punishments were to be implemented, nobody will join the profession as drivers, they say.