Record surge in women patronage in KSRTC on Priyadarshini scheme’s inaugural day

The inaugural day of the Priyadarshini scheme, introduced by the state government on KSRTC Ordinary buses from Monday, June 15, witnessed an unprecedented ridership among women passengers. The company issued tickets to a total of 13.29 lakh women passengers, an increase of 81% compared to 7.34 lakh women passengers traveling on the same day (June 8) in the previous week.

Of the 13.29 lakh women passengers who traveled on the opening day of the programme, zero tickets were issued to 7.83 lakh women, enabling them to enjoy the benefits of the programme.

At the same time, the number of male passengers, which was 6 million 94 thousand 799 on June 8, decreased to 2 thousand 26 thousand 673 on Monday. While the number of female passengers increased by 5 million 95 thousand 245 on Monday, the number of male passengers decreased by 4 million 68 thousand 126, a decrease of 67 percent.

However, the total number of passengers witnessed only a slight increase; 15,56,611 passengers traveled on 15 June compared to 14,29,492 passengers on 8 June. Revenue collection also dropped from ₹3.23 crore on June 8 to ₹2.79 crore on June 15.

KSRTC suffered a revenue loss of ₹2.20 crore on the first day following the launch of the scheme. However, the state government will compensate the damage.

According to officials, the increase in the number of female passengers and the corresponding decrease in the number of male passengers is due to the higher seat occupancy of women benefiting from the program, causing many male passengers to prefer other bus categories.

Under the ‘Priyadarshini’ programme, women and transgender persons can travel free of charge across seven categories of KSRTC services: Ordinary, City Ordinary, limited-stop Ordinary, fair stage Ordinary, town-to-city, point-to-point and Gramavandi services. The plan, promised in the UDF’s election manifesto, was launched by Chief Minister VD Satheeshan on Monday.