Gujarat govt bans school picnic buses plying at night

Close on the heels of accidents involving buses, in which a number of school children lost their lives and many others were injured, the state government on Wednesday banned school picnic buses from plying at night.

Eight children from Surat were killed and several others were injured when a private bus they were travelling in fell into a 300-feet deep gorge in Dangs on Saturday night. They had gone to Dangs for a picnic. In another incident, a bus conductor died and 24 children of a school in Ahmedabad were injured when their bus rammed into a tree in Godhra in the wee hours of Tuesday.

Deputy chief minister Nitin Patel told reporters that the decision had been taken during the weekly meeting of the state cabinet, presided over by chief minister Vijay Rupani.

"Our government has decided to impose a ban on buses with school children from plying between 11pm and 6am to avoid accidents such as these in the future," Patel said.

The deputy CM said the decision had been taken bearing in mind the safety of children.

"The bus operators will be required to stop the journey during night time. They will also have to make lodging and boarding arrangements for children," he further added.

Chief secretary Dr JN Singh said, "The issue was discussed with utter sincerity in the cabinet. The government has made it mandatory for school authorities to get sanction from concerned RTO office for educational tours. The RTO will assess the condition of the vehicle for transportation and number of students travelling on the bus viz-a-viz capacity of the vehicle."

In case of both accidents, private luxury buses had been hired for picnics. In the first case, the bus was hired by a tuition class. Eight children and two others were killed in the accident in Dangs. In the second one, one person was killed and two dozen children were injured when the bus, returning from a picnic in Madhya Pradesh, met with an accident near Godhra.

The Ahmedabad RTO released a circular saying that all tour operators will have to abide by the new rules and that the number of children can't exceed the total capacity of the vehicle. The RTO also announced that strict measures would be taken against those tour operators who flout rules.