In a major relief to inter-state bus passengers, the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) on Sunday resumed services to Karnataka.
Every day, TNSTC operates 481 buses to Karnataka. But, all its services were stopped last Tuesday because of unrest in Karnataka over the release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu. “We have resumed all our services including the buses via Mandya and Mysuru as the situation improved. We hope there won’t be any untoward incidents,” said an official.
KSRTC has also resumed its services to Mandya, Mysuru, Hassan and Chamarajanagar, which was recently suspended due to the protests. “While our bus services to Chennai and Vellore via Kolar and Hosur were unaffected all these days, we had to suspend several services to Cauvery basin districts after protesters blocked several roads, including Mysuru-Bengaluru highway. But now all services are operational,” said a KSRTC official.
Many commuters who are employed in Benguluru and also many labourers from border areas, including Sathyamangalam, are relieved. “TNSTC buses are cheap and frequent. It was difficult for us to reach the workplace on time after it stopped services,” said K Ramkumar from Hosur.
Many techies from Tamil Nadu working in IT companies in Bengaluru are also happy. “I was planning to go to my native in Salem on Thursday evening because of the long weekend but I postponed the journey because of the lack of bus services,” said K Swathi, an employye of an IT firim in Electronics City.
