‘School bus blacklisted, didn’t have fitness doc’
The school bus of Dayawati Modi Public School, from which a Class 4 student looked out of the window and died after his head hit a pole, was operating without a fitness certificate and continued to run despite being blacklisted, said officials of the regional transport department.
The bus is among the 756 school buses belonging to 166 schools, which were blacklisted due to non-renewal of fitness certificates.
A fitness certificate is issued to indicate that a vehicle is complying with different norms and procedures and is fit to be driven on road. It is renewed by the transport department after proper physical and technical inspection of the vehicle. It certifies that the vehicle complies with the provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. It also certifies that the vehicle complies with the safety aspects
According to the guidelines for safety of children and fitness of school buses, every school vehicle should have the words “school bus” and “on school duty” written on the front and rear; no school bus should ferry passengers other than students/ teachers; every school bus should have names, addresses, classes and blood groups of children and route charts; every bus should have male or female staff for the safety of children; the maximum speed of the school bus should not be more than 40kmph and the installation of speed governors in every school bus is mandatory.
Police seized the bus of Dayawati Modi Public School, after 10-year-old Anurag Bhardwaj stuck his head out of the window of the moving school bus and died of severe injuries after his head hit the pole of a gantry gate near the school on Wednesday morning.
“We have blacklisted the vehi
cles whose fitness has expired. The fitness certificate of the school bus involved in the death of the Class 4 student expired on March 7 last year. The vehicle was blacklisted on October 8, 2021, following which notices were sent to the vehicle owner to renew the fitness certificate. A report has also been sent to the district authorities in this regard,” said Vishwjeet Pratap Singh, additional regional transport officer.
According to the records of the transport department, some of the prominent schools whose buses have been blacklisted involve the ones located in Ahimsa Khand, Indirapuram, Meerut Road Industrial Area, Shakti Khand in Indirapuram, Sanjay Nagar, Dasna, Mohan Nagar, Vasundhara, Loni and
Modi Nagar.
On Wednesday, police had said the bus was owned by Dayawati Modi Public School and was not hired by them. HT tried several times to reach out to the school via landline but there was no response. School principal NP Singh also did not take calls.
“We have formed several teams in different zones and a special drive has been launched till April 26 to find school buses operating without renewing its fitness certificate. All the 756 buses have been blacklisted on the portal and notices have already been served to all the 166 institutions,” he added.
The death of the boy on the moving school bus has shone the spotlight on school transport and raised concerns among parents, who use such mode of conveyance
to send their wards to schools.
“The schools charge a hefty transportation fee from parents and they are entrusted with the safety of our children. It is complete laxity on the part of the school and also the transport department that a bus was running operations even after getting blacklisted. This further indicates that there maybe other blacklisted vehicles plying on the road and putting the lives of children at risk,” said Vivek Tyagi, spokesperson of Ghaziabad parents’ association.
Police said that they are waiting for official communication from the transport department and the issue of fitness certificate and backlisting of the bus will be incorporated as evidence in the death of the Class 4 boy.