Thiruvananthapuram: Passengers find it difficult to read destination boards of mini electric buses operated by KSRTC in the city at night because digital boards are not working, and hand-painted boards do not have adequate lighting. Some of the buses have destination boards scribbled on white cardboard.Though some of the buses have route numbers, the boards are important because the services take an unconventional circular route. The buses bought under Smart City Mission are equipped with digital route boards, but they are not working in many of the services. The staff have installed hand-painted route boards close to the windscreen but without adequate lighting. There are 150 electric buses. The bus stops also lack lights for the passengers to read the boards. When a passenger complained about the lack of lights in a bus headed from Statue to Poojappura direction, the crew did not understand and became angry. P Ramesh Kumar, a passenger, said it is difficult to read the boards on most of these buses. “I have to wait until the bus reaches the bus stop,” he added. Many people are seen asking the crew or the passengers on board for the route because often the white route board is crammed with names of too many places. People have raised the issue, but the crew is helpless and often does not understand the problem. Sources said that these buses are operated from depots at East Fort, Peroorkada and Pappanamcode, and the destination and the route have to be pre-loaded using software. However, the software is not allotted to KSRTC staff to make changes. As these buses are not being operated on a fixed route every day, staff are forced to use hand-painted destination boards. There has been no attempt to address the issue, though the boards have been unused for close to a year.
