Only six out of the 40-odd private schools of Jamshedpur have submitted applications to avail of city buses to ferry students till Monday, the date fixed by the East Singhbhum district education department for the cradles to respond.

According to official records, JH Tarapore School (Dhatkidih) and Tarapore School, Agrico, have requisitioned for five buses each. Sakchi-based ADLS Sunshine School, DAV Patelnagar (Agrico), Motilal Nehru Public School (MNPS) in Sakchi and Vig English School (Chotta Govindpur) have sought two buses each.

Nargis Madan, director of JH Tarapore School, admitted that most schools were reluctant to use the city buses.

"Even we have apprehensions and would like to discuss the matter with the administration before taking the final plunge. We have applied for five buses and if all goes well, we might increase our requisition too," Madan said. East Singhbhum deputy commissioner (DC) Amitabh Kaushal said they were open to discussions with the schools. "We have not closed the application window. Schools can still apply for the bus service," he said.

Jamshedpur Abhibhavak Sangh, a parents' outfit, submitted a memorandum to the DC, reminding him about a Jharkhand Education Tribunal 2011 order, asking schools to operate buses safely.

In another development, Jamshedpur School Vahan Seva Sanchalak Samiti, claiming to represent over 4,000 pool van operators, issued a cellphone number - 7543912315 - for parents to lodge complaints against any arbitrary fare hike between 9am and 1pm.<>“We will convince the concerned school van operator against increasing fare as we are working out logistics of school van fare from different locations based on mileage of a vehicle and number of students and would be releasing a fare chart for different vehicles for different locations soon,� said Santosh Mandal, secretary of the Samity.

This became apparent with the lukewarm response of the private cradles to the administration proposal to use the JNNURM fleet of repaired but idle city buses.

the day fixed by the East Singhbhum district education department for the schools to apply for availing bus service, only five out of the 40-odd private cradles applied for the bus service.

Incidentally, on July 8 representatives of 40-odd schools (both CBSE and ICSE affiliated) had been called by district superintendent of education Indu Bhusan at district education office to discuss about administration proposal to use JNNURM fleet of repaired but idle city buses (50 29-seater Swaraj Mazda make buses). The move came after unsafe methods (overloading) adopted by rogue school pool vans operators while ferrying school students and administration crackdown against them. Â

However, most of the school representatives had raises several apprehension about running of the buses. The district education department had then asked those schools willing to avail school bus service to submit their requisition by Monday (July 13).