With the Telangana government completely lifting the lockdown without any restrictions in place, the Telangana State Road Transport Services (TSRTC) has announced that it will resume its interstate bus services from Monday. However, the services would run in accordance with the restrictions that are placed in the respective states. When it comes to neighbouring Andhra Pradesh for instance, TSRTC services will run between 6 am and 6 pm, depending on the occupancy of seats.
TSRTC spokesperson R Kiran, speaking to The News Minute said, "We are yet to understand how the restrictions in various states are in place, accordingly we have to plan our services. Currently this would be a trial run and each bus will run only if there is enough occupancy as otherwise it's not viable." Meanwhile, the seating capacity is also restricted to 50% and the tickets can be purchased either online or at the counter.
Recently, Andhra has announced lockdown relaxations and has imposed a night curfew from 6 pm to 6 am. This applies to the entire state except for East Godavari district, which still has a high positivity rate; the movement of people is allowed only between 6 am and 2 pm. The night curfew will be in place till June 30.
Meanwhile for Karnataka, the TSRTC would run bus services from 5 am to 7 pm with an exception to Bengaluru. It can also be noted that bus services will be halted on weekends. Starting from Friday 7 pm to Monday 5 am, there won’t be any services available for Karnataka from Telangana, according to the TSRTC officials.
As per the latest announcement, in Bengaluru, the night curfew will be in place from 7 pm to 5 am every day and the weekend curfew will be from 7 pm on Friday to 5 am on Monday. This will be in effect until July 5.
The bus services would be modified according to the respective restrictions placed in the state. There are about 1,000 buses running to various states from Telangana.
With the ‘decrease’ in the COVID-19 positivity rate in Telangana, the Cabinet on Saturday has decided to lift the restrictions completely. However, if anybody is found in public places without wearing a mask, they will be fined with an amount of Rs 1,000.