New Delhi: Further unlocking the national capital, Lt Governor Anil Baijal on Friday has approved the Delhi government’s proposal to allow public buses to run with full seating capacity even as COVID-19 cases are witnessing a surge in the city.
At present, the public buses are running with 20 passengers in view of the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic.
Baijal, who is the chairman of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA), has also approved resuming inter-state bus services and the process to plan a standard operating procedure for it is on and the service is likely to restart from next week.
Officials said that the issue of raising the number of passengers in DTC and Cluster buses was raised in a DDMA meeting on October 23. Transport minister Kailash Gahlot had sought permission for full seating without any passenger standing on buses.
The number of DTC and Cluster buses seat up to 40-45 passengers. Bus stops in the city witnessed long queues as a result of reduced capacity of passengers allowed in the buses.
The development comes at a time when the national capital on Thursday recorded 5,739 fresh COVID-19 cases, which is the highest single-day spike till date, as the infection tally in the city mounted to over 3.75 lakh.
The active cases tally on Thursday rose to 30,952 from 29,378 the previous day, as per the bulletin. It said that the total number of cases has climbed to 3,75,753.