NOIDA: At Botanical Garden metro station on Monday, there were only two Uttar Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation buses bound for Pari Chowk. Almost every other vehicle pulling up to the stop was a private car, a shuttle, or an unmarked bus, with conductors leaning out to call destinations to anyone who might need one.The vacuum left by public transport is being filled by these private shuttles, taxis and buses running between Greater Noida, Noida and Delhi.People, especially women working across NCR, continue to rely on them because they are cheaper than app-based taxis, readily available and often go directly to areas they ask for.Some of these services can be booked online, through platforms such as Noida Shuttle, RouteMatic and FlixBus. Others simply idle at informal pick-up points in Pari Chowk, Botanical Garden, Sector 132, Yamuna Expressway Zero Point, Gaur City or Jaypee Wishtown, leaving passengers with little more than a fare and a destination, and no real way to know who is driving or what vehicle they are boarding.For commuters, and especially for women travelling after sundown, that uncertainty is a constant calculation. Khushi (24) travels between Mathura and Noida every weekend for work.On Saturdays, when she has to take a bus to her Noida home alone, she calls her father, who drives to Pari Chowk to pick her up. “It is for my safety,” she said. “Unless it is daytime, I don’t take the risk of boarding a private bus alone.”Shajiya (21), a digital marketing student who took the metro in from Laxmi Nagar and was found waiting on a platform near Botanical Garden bus stop on Monday evening, said she lives in Pari Chowk. “I have been waiting here for 15 minutes. All the buses that are going right now are private ones. I am waiting for a UPSRTC bus,” she said. Her mother has told her to avoid the private ones. “Since it is daytime, I can wait for a bus,” she said.A few metres away, Dev Kumar Yadav and his sister Meena were trying to find a bus to Mathura. After asking several drivers with no luck, they gave up and headed towards Sector 37 bus stand instead. “My sister had come to tie a rakhi. Back then, my cousin had dropped her to Noida, but now I am going to drop her back,” Yadav said, holding his sister’s hand. “It is not safe these days and she is also new to the city,” he added.Nowhere is the absence of reliable public transport more visible than at Pari Chowk, where passengers gather under the footbridge for buses headed across western UP, to Agra, Etah, Hathras and Mathura, alongside shorter routes to Botanical Garden. “We get passengers here. Most of them know that the bus stops here,” said Ramesh, a private-bus conductor, who charges Rs 250 for Agra and Rs 180 for Mathura.Some of these buses carry posters of political leaders and bear a passing resemblance to UPSRTC buses, a similarity that can make it hard for a passenger in a hurry to tell a state-run service from a private one.Noida Assistant Regional Transport Officer Udit Narayan Pandey said private buses are required to be registered and drivers must hold valid licences. Police verification of drivers and conductors is also mandated by law, he said, though he acknowledged the provision is not always enforced. “We conduct verification of these buses from time to time, issue challans and ensure that all the rules are followed,” he said. Under Motor Vehicles Act and Central Motor Vehicle Rules, transport vehicles require valid registration, permits and fitness certificates.
