City buses parked at the Bhubaneswar terminal. (Right) People queue on the road waiting for buses. Pictures by Sanjib Mukherjee

Bhubaneswar, April 17: Commuters continued to suffer for the fourth consecutive day with most of the buses keeping off the roads.

Although the mayor and the operators of the city bus service promised to restore normality, there seems to be no end to the miseries of the commuters.

The autorickshaw drivers, who perceive the buses as a livelihood threat, made a killing, charging passengers at will. The city bus service has been hit by an undeclared cease work by the employees including the drivers who are demanding better service conditions.

“I had to appear for a banking examination at a centre in KIIT University. I did not get a bus and had to hire an auto-rickshaw. The situation was worse around noon when test came to an end. I waited for more than an hour for the bus in vain and finally paid Rs 50 to an autorickshaw though the fare was more than double the usual,” said Mamata Rani, a student.

As it was a Sunday and there were many competitive examinations going on in different school in the city, students suffered the most. The other set to suffer on account of the problem were the tourists. “I wanted to visit Dhauli along with my family. I read in the newspapers that the city buses would ply as usual from today. But there were no buses available. Finally, we hired a taxi and paid much more than what we would have liked to spend,” said Rahul Sethi, a tourist.

The bus service had faced a similar problem last February when the employees went on a strike for two days. The people had suffered all kinds of problems during that strike.

Nishikant Mishra, the chairman of Dream Team Sahara (DTS) that operates the service, had said yesterday that some of the employees had taken leave for Pana Sankranti festival and were expected to join work today. He had expressed hope that the service would be normal from today. However, there was little change in the scenario today. Even mayor Anant Narayan Jena’s assurance of normalising the service did not translate into reality.

Meanwhile, the few employees who ran a skeletal service today admitted that the majority of the staff was yet to report for duty. The employees alleged that they were being forced to work for nearly 16 hours instead of eight hours they were asked to put at the time of hiring.

They are also demanding reinstatement of their sacked colleagues. The authorities had sacked nearly 10 employees on charges of misbehaviour with passengers, rash driving and indiscipline.

However, the authorities alleged that the sacked employees and some vested interests were threatening to derail the bus service. Recently, the authorities had also lodged a complaint against some of the alleged saboteurs.

However, the sacked employees refuted the charge. “We have not incited anyone to go on strike. They have gone on leave on their own,” said Sanjib Kumar Behera, one of the sacked employees.