A study on Public Transportation System in Capital Complex, Arunachal Pradesh (With special reference of JnNURM)

Shibabrata Choudhury North Eastern Regional Institute of Science and Technology, Arunachal Pradesh

Praveen Katiyar North Eastern Regional Institute of Science and Technology, Arunachal Pradesh

Abstract The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM) at Arunachal Pradesh is amongst the nations first phase pilot study of National Urban Transport Policy (NUTP). Objective of this pro ject was to enhance the transportation facility for the urban poor. Arunachal Pradesh economic growth is often constrained due to inadequate transportation infrastructure and services. Frequent landslides due to heavy rain often create problems in transportation in Arunachal Pradesh. The rising population of the state with rising urban poverty and growing demands affect transportation service delivery. There is a need to revitalize this sector in the interest of 200 passengers daily using this system in the capital complex of Arunachal Pradesh. This paper outlines preference reasons for public transportation mode of communication in general and JnNURM in specific in capital complex of the state. This paper also analyzes the performance of JnNURM on a sustainable track in the years to come.

Introduction The concentration of economic growth and socio-economic overheads in urban areas has been responsible for the rapid urbanization and growth of cities. The centralization of social services like education, health, as well as employment opportunities is a major cause of migration from rural Arunachal Pradesh to its capital complex. Road transport, the only transportation facility (excluding the unsafe Pawanhans helicopter services) in this locality play a vital role in speeding up the process of socio-economic growth of the areas. So road transportation helps in transporting both necessary productive resources for marketing, and human resources. The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission operates 20 numbers of buses in about 20km radius of the capital complex in Arunachal Pradesh, providing transportation facility to more than 2000 peoples on daily basis. It is amongst the nations first phase pilot study of National Urban Transport Policy (NUTP). The objective of the study was to find out the preference reasons for public transportation mode of communication in capital complex, Arunachal Pradesh. The study also focuses the motivating factors to travel in public transportation in general and JnNURM in specific. Review literature Rapid economic development exerts pressure on all infrastructure services vital for economic efficiency and social sustainability, particularly transport infrastructure (Justus (1998). There has been rapid growth in both vehicle production and registration worldwide. While 246 million motor vehicles were registered worldwide in 1970, that number had grown to 709 million in 1997 (Powers and Nicastri 2000). Vehicular emissions account for 4080 percent of air quality problems in the megacities in developing countries (Ghose 2002). In India, sustaining this increase in economic productivity is contingent on meeting the mobility demand that such economic growth creates, and hence on optimally utilizing existing infrastructure (Gowda (1999). The efficiency, quality, and scope of urban transport facilities are affected by the financial position and financial challenges by city public transport undertakings. (Kamble(2010)). According to Padam, S., and Singh, S. K.(2001) the financial problems stemming from Indias low per-capita income are probably the most important challenges facing Indian urban public transport, but there are many others as well: inefficiency, roadway congestion, traffic accidents, lack of planning, overcrowding, noise, and total lack of coordination of any kind. Dargay and Hanly (1999) passenger kilometers as the measure of demand for their aggregate area specific analysis of travel demand. However, using only the number of trips or passengers as a measure of travel demand ignores an important characteristic of demand, the length of each trip.

Research methodology Formal study type was being adopted to find out the answers for the research questions. The required data during the study was obtained from the following two sources: Secondary data was taken from various sources such as published research papers, official broacher and website of Ministry of Urban Transportation, Ministry of Urban Development, National Urban Transport Policy. The secondary data also collected from office of Arunachal Pradesh State Transport (APST) office, District Commissioner office at Papumpare, reference material from website and government websites etc. Primary Data was collected from the passengers of public transport at Papumpare based on the questionnaire designed appropriate to reflect significantly to research study. For the study purpose, selective random sampling method was considered. The sample size was 75. The primary data were also collected through interview with the various stakeholders such as APST official personnel, people operating auto, and private buses. Personally travelled in various modes of transport systems of capital complex of Arunachal Pradesh for the observation studies that can strengthen this study was also adopted. Collected data was analyzed by using various statistical methods. These are frequencies, percentages; means, weight-age average, and correlation were use for analyzing the collected data. Public transportation and JnNURM The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM) was launched in December 2005 by the Central Government to provide financial assistance to cities for various urban development projects including urban transport and to improve the quality of life in Indian cities. It is a reform based mission. NUTP started up as a stimulus package of Rs.1, 20536 cores for 63 cities of the country. Buses contribute as the most important mode of Public transport across all cities in India. Under the Second Stimulus Package, purchase of buses for public transport was permitted under JnNURM during 2009 as a one-time measure. As per Press Information Bureau Government of India so far, a total of 15260 buses have been approved for 61 Mission cities. Itanager, the capital complex of Arunachal Pradesh comes under the category C with less than one million populations and annual support Rs. 892.9 crore. In January 2010, 20 number of JnNURM buses launched in Arunachal Pradesh. In the month of February it was started operation in Arunachal Pradesh. The state seems to be committed to make its presence in national economic map. These days the state economy is characterized by its growth rates, expanding trade and markets, industrial development that started attracting foreign investments. The state economic growth is often constrained due to inadequate transportation infrastructure and services. The rising population of the state with rising urban poverty and growing demands affect transportation service delivery in towns and cities.

Preference reasons of public transportation in the capital complex, Arunachal Pradesh A questionnaire survey was conducted to measure the mode of transportation used by the peoples for communication at the Capital complex of Arunachal Pradesh. In the below Table 2.1, 22 of them rely on two-wheelers, 11 rely on fourwheelers for transportation as well as using the public transportation and all are using the public transportation from total samples (75). This table says that the entire respondent uses the public transportation for communication at the Capital Complex, Arunachal Pradesh. 2- Wheeler 4-Wheeler Public Transportation 36

Frequency Often 10 1 Very 8 6 30 Often Rarely 4 4 9 Table 2.1. Mode of Transportation used by the peoples of capital complex, Arunachal pradesh In itanagar, public transport is supplied mainly by private auto rickshaw, tempo, private buses, multi utility vehicles (Tata sumo, Bolero, etc.), and APST bus services for the population of 34,970. The government backed APST covers the whole Arunachal Pradesh. It is the largest state in the north east India that covers an area of 83,743 sq km., with evergreen forest covering more than 82 percent of the state. The state has the thinnest population density in the country with only 13 persons per sq km. In order to serve the whole state it is a difficult task to cater a qualitative service to every corner of the state. As a result the people over capital complex face very low bus service frequency. They depend mainly with the over-crowded 50 odds private services for transportation. The majority of the people are dependent on the services in schools, colleges, university, hospitals, and other basic need based government services. The private businesses have also grown up based on to fulfill the demands of these people. Due to financial condition the personal vehicle seems not to be an affordable option for majority in the locality. Below table shows the vehicle registration in the whole papumpare district (the capital complex is situated in this district) in the last three years.

2008 Vehicles Two-wheeler LMV (private) Auto, Tempo LMV (Passenger)

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2009 3495 3176 144 215

2010 2774 2941 51 68

1370 1768 70 98

2011 (up to March) 417 645 15 0

Table 2.2. vehicles registered under district papumpare, Arunachal Pradesh Source: District transport office, Naharlagun, Arunachal Pradesh

Apart from the economic condition of the people the unfavorable geographic condition is also another cause for Public transportation. As the place is located in the hilly area, the narrow, curvy routes seems to be very much accident prone. The regions average rainfall of above 3000 mm per year and climatic variation from the sub- tropical in the south to Alpine in the north. Rainfall is not only restricted to the rainy season, it is perennial in this locality (Annexure-I). Heavy rain fall causes poor condition of road; moreover the landslides caused due to severe continuous rain stop the regular road communication. There are no planned parking places for the vehicles in many places of the city. Due to maintenance cost of vehicles, discomfort in travel, and parking of vehicles, it is often a convenient option to travel by the public transporter instead of personal vehicles. Motivating factors to travel in JnNURM As per the questionnaire survey based on two parameters cost and convenience amongst public transporters,the ranking was done on 1-10 ranking scale (with 1 as the minimum and 10 as maximum). It was calculated on the weighted average method.

Figure 2.1 Ranking of public transport vehicles As per the study it was found that JnNURM ranks the highest with 7.64 followed by tracker 5.54, taxi with 4.56. In this survey government led APST ranks the lowest with 2.29. JnNURM offers the qualitative services at a cheaper rate as compared to its counter parts in the public transportation. The table 2.2 shows various motivating factors and the respective score of JnNURM. Parameters Brand association Wide area coverage Group reservation Value added services
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Score (Total 100) 65 55 35 29

Table 2.3 Motivating factors of JnNURM Performance of JnNURM in capital complex, Arunachal Pradesh The table no. 2.5 shows the Correlation co-efficient between numbers of buses working, total working days by all running buses, distance covered by all buses, earning and expenses / month (Annexure II). The peculiarities of the geographic, road, frequent strikes have not allowed to maintain linear relationship with all variables. Running buses Running Buses Working days Distance covered Earning Expenses 1.00 0.31 0.35 1.00 0.46 1.00 1.00 Distance covered

working days

Earning Expenses

-0.10 0.41 0.41 1.00 0.03 0.53 0.66 0.65 Table 2.4 Correlation co-efficient matrix for JnNURM Buses

The graph 2.2 depicts a linear growth for the initial four months (i.e. from May to August).The fluctuation of 30 percentages down is observed in the month of September (Annexure-III &IV). However it recovered the trend in the following two months. Less number of passengers due to bad weather has made the income all time low in the month of January. Again due to bad road condition there was a road conversion taken place. Buses used to travel via Doimukh to Banderdewa, for which it has to cover an extra distance of 5 km. on each trip, so it could not make usual trips. It can be clearly observed this was the month when it has also witnessed the lowest expenses in the 11 months study. The authority has decided to double the ticket price due to compensate the extra lengthy route. The bus again came to its original trend along with the repairing of roads in a very fast pattern.

Graph 2.2 Revenue and Expenses by JnNURM Buses from 2010 May till 2011 march

Ticket price was raised from March 2011. The previous price from Banderdewa to Itanagar was Rs 20/- was modified as Rs. 30/-. In the initial phase there was a promotional motive due to which it has kept the price at Rs.20/, which was even lower than other transportation alternatives such as auto, ASTC bus. From the month of March the pricing is at par with the others. But As per JnNURM guideline it is Rs 1.23 per kilometer, which comes around Rs.42/- for the distance of Banderdewa to Itanagar. The higher pricing may not have any impact on maintaining JNURM leading position. Conclusion JnNURM buses are providing better facility to the urban people at the lower price. JnNURM buses helps to peoples of this locality by providing best way of communication mode of transportation at lower price and helps the socio-economic development of this locality. Having huge demand for various value added services for future use by the public, need to make better plan for more no. passenger can get the more benefit. However the state government should develop the infrastructure for main bus stoppage at the Capital complex. More no. of buses should be used for city services rather than staff and student services. For financial stability of JnNURM the authority must allow more no of buses for city services rather than for staff and student services, surprise ticket checking can compensate certain generic constraints at this place, as it has to prepare for tough challenges for its sustainability in long run.

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