[Resolved]  Varsha Travels — Victimized by Varsha Travels, Bangalore

Address:

Bangalore, Karnataka

This is about our bus journey from Bangalore to Goa in A/C SLEEPER EXECUTIVE LUXURY from Varsha Travels on 1st October, 2014. It was one of the most terrible bus travel experience we ever had. Here are few reasons why: 1. We got to know just an hour earlier from our pickup time that our pickup point, Indiranagar, had been cancelled. We were asked to travel to their office to board the bus. We got to know this when we called them just to confirm details of our pickup point. We tried all taxi services but could not get any taxi at that time because there was not much time left. We had to walk another 1/2 a km from our place to find an auto and that too much above normal fare. 2. Once we reached the Varsha travels office, it was jam packed with huge line and what we came to know was that they cancelled pickups for all travellers. Looks like it was intentionally mis-advertised to gain favour because traveller would like to prefer a bus service with a pick up point closer to their place. 3. We additionaly came to know that, for many, the bus had been degraded to Semi Sleeper from Sleeper. I had to be in that packed line in a small suffocating room for half an hour to confirm our bus. Luckily, at least at that time, our bus was still an A/C SLEEPER EXECUTIVE LUXURY, as booked. 4. Our pickup was supposed to be at 9:00 PM from Indiranagar but finally the bus started at around 12:00 AM, next day. The bus was in no condition to be called an EXECUTIVE LUXURY. The outside of the bus was broken and seats were worn out. A/C was not ON at the time of boarding and we were told it would start working once the bus starts moving, which was at least half an hour away, so we had to spend time in that bus in suffocation for that half an hour. 5. We woke up, it was around 7:30 AM in the morning, because we felt some suffocation. We realised the bus engine is ON but A/C is not and the bus is not moving. We came out of bus and saw left side front tyre is missing. We had to spend a considerable amount of time, around an hour or so, standing/walking outside the bus before it was in a condition to move again. 6. A/C worked very briefly after that as they switched it OFF in another half an hour and said that it had to be done because bus is not able to take any load. A/C DID NOT WORK therafter. So effectively more than 50% of our journey we had to spend without the A/C. 7. The bus stopped around 12:30 PM for the first time that we would have some breakfast/lunch/FOOD. 8. They had another surprise in store for us when they asked us to disembark the current bus and move to another smaller one, which could not even accomodate all passengers, at around 3:00 PM. This, we were told by driver, is because radiator is leaking water. But some other passengers talked to other bus driver and told that it was possibly because the earlier bus did not have requisite permit to enter Goa. For another 3 hours, to Panjim, we had a near excruciating journey on that bus, sitting on small seats with people standing all around, no A/C, and no way to straighten our back and cushion our bottoms. We finally reached, and we thank GOD for that, Panjim at around 6:15 PM, effectively reducing our 3 day holiday to a 2 day holiday, wasting a whole [censored] day from our vacation. The bus was supposed to reach Panjim at around 9:30 AM in the morning but ended up reaching there in the evening. I am not able to express in words what we felt (and for a really long time) during this travel, along with our kid. Bus No. assigned to us: 1999