Opposing the decision of the Fare Fixation Committee (FFC) to increase the fare of Mumbai Metro, the Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) on Saturday claimed before the Bombay high court
Opposing the decision of the Fare Fixation Committee (FFC) to increase the fare of Mumbai Metro, the Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) on Saturday claimed before the Bombay high court that as per the terms, the project operator of the Metro was not supposed to earn a profit for the initial eight years.
The division bench of chief justice of Bombay high court Manjula Chellur and justice M.S. Sonak was hearing a bunch of petitions challenging the Metro fare hike.
Senior counsel Aspi Chenoy while arguing for the MMRDA told the court that the FFC, while deciding to increase the fare of Metro did not take into consideration many factors.
According to him the idea behind starting the Metro train was to take the pressure off roads. He explained to the bench that as per the calculation done at the initial stages the operator of Metro was supposed to earn profit almost after eight years when the number of passengers were expected to increase gradually. He told the court that the object of keeping the fare low was to increase the number of passengers. However, passengers would reduce if the fare was increased and the purpose of launching the Metro would be defeated.
Mr Chenoy also said that the project was not a private commercial business but was started to provide suitable economic mass transit system and had any private company come to government to start a Metro, the government would have charged for allowing the use of its roads, land, among others.
MMOPL has claimed it is incurring loss of lakhs of rupees daily and hence needed to hike fares.
