Agartala, Oct. 30: The Tripura Road Transport Corporation (TRTC) authority is incurring huge losses in keeping its daily service to Dhaka going almost without passengers.

Even on the inaugural day of the service, the authorities of Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation (BRTC) and TRTC had expressed misgivings on the viability of the service. This is because of lack of traffic on both sides and the newly-imposed travel tax of Rs 500 per head, which tourists entering Bangladesh are supposed to pay.

Chief minister Manik Sarkar and Bangladesh’s transport minister Nazmul Hoda had said the question of commercial viability would be kept in abeyance. The first month has proved to be disastrous for the TRTC.

During this period, on an average, five passengers went by the bus Maitree to Dhaka daily and on the return journey, it got less than three passengers. However, BRTC’s 45-seater bus Shyamali fared slightly better by bringing to Agartala 220 passengers in the course of 31 trips and taking back 250 passengers.

Sources in the TRTC said that their Bangladesh counterpart was incurring less losses because they were getting many passengers on the 145-km journey within Bangladesh from Dhaka to Akhaura checkpost before entering Agartala.

“We do not have this advantage because the distance within Indian territory between our bus terminal and Akhaura checkpost on the western outskirts of Agartala is only three km and there is no question of any local passenger getting into our air-conditioned bus to travel these three km,” Narayan Shil, an official of the TRTC, said. He asserted that some Bangladeshi passengers were coming here for treatment.

On the losses suffered by the TRTC, Shil said no accounting had been done but it would run into lakhs of rupees. He said the withdrawal of Rs 500 per head as travel tax, coupled with simplification of procedure in issuing passport and visa and introduction of package tours, would help the service achieve viability in future.