Women, above 60, to get free travel in UPSRTC buses

Lucknow, Feb 16 (IANS) Women above 60 years will get to travel for free in UP State Roadways Transport Corporation (UPSRTC) buses soon.

To ensure transparency, UPSRTC will issue cards to the eligible women. The card will have the personal details of women passengers.

"We are working on the project. The card will help the corporation maintain a record of the number of women using the facility and other details," said general manager (IT), UPSRTC, Yajuvendra Kumar.

The scheme will come into effect once the govt order (GO) on it is issued.

UPSRTC had done a survey between March 2022 and March 2023 and found that over 3.7 lakh women passengers travelled in its buses daily. This was more than 30 per cent of the total passengers boarding UPSRTC buses daily.

At least 88,000 of the women passengers covered in the survey were above 60 years, which was 7 per cent of passengers travelling in these buses daily.

The state government has been providing free travel facility to all women in UPSRTC buses on Raksha Bandhan since 2017. Over one crore women have availed the facility between 2017 and 2023.