Passengers of Delhi-Kathmandu bus service dwindle post quake

NEW DELHI: Passengers travelling to Nepal through DTC's Delhi-Kathmandu bus service has registered a sharp decline after the Himalayan nation was ravaged by a massive earthquake in which around 10,000 people are feared killed so far.

Delhi-Kathmandu bus service, which was launched in November last year during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Nepal, is run by Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC).

Around 35 per cent passengers, who booked their tickets to Nepal, didn't turn up yesterday and similarly, around 15 per cent passengers didn't use the bus service today.

"42 passengers had booked bus tickets to Kathmandu on Monday, but out of these numbers, only 27 passengers turned up and 15 passengers did not come," DTC's deputy CGM Dr R S Minhas said.

He said that today, 35 passengers were supposed to go to Nepal through Delhi-Kathmandu bus service, but 30 passengers turned up.

Officials said that since the tremors struck Nepal, numbers of passengers going to the Himalayan nation has declined.

Delhi-Kathmandu bus, which is the country's second international bus service, runs every day except Sunday. The corporation has also been running Delhi-Lahore bus, which was launched by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in March 1999.

The fare of the bus has been kept Rs 2,300 per passenger. In November 2014, Delhi-Kathmandu bus had been flagged off by Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari here at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi is in Kathmandu to attend 18th SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) Summit from November 26-27.

Hundreds of people are still trapped under tonnes of rubble in capital Kathmandu and some of the worst-affected remote mountainous area.