| Address: Mumbai City, Maharashtra |
The following incident happened on the 9th of May 2011.
I arrived at 5.20 am at the Neeta Volvo booking office directly opposite Gokul Hotel, Borivili (West), Mumbai in order to book a ticket to Pune.
The attendant told me that there was place available on the 5.30 am bus and issued me a ticket charging me Rs. 330, an amount that seemed excessive at the time. I had half a mind to tell him to eff-himself and give me the correct rate which works out to around Rs. 225 but I left it at that and took the ticket.
There was a spanking White Mercedes bus standing in front of the counter which I thought was the Pune bus; it turned out to be a Nasik bound bus instead.
The Pune bound Volvo bus drove up at 5.40 pm. The window to the immediate right of the entrance was smashed and covered in cellophane. When I entered I saw the bus was dark and all the light fixtures were broken. There was no light in the bus. The bus left Borivili (West) at 6 am sharp. We took the highway route and as we passed Malad, the air-conditioning system began to start and stop and the bus began to get progressively hot. By the time we reached Santa Cruz the air-conditioning had failed entirely. I approached the bus conductor and he kept switching the air-conditioning on as it kept switching off automatically a few seconds later. It was obviously broken. After another 15 minutes it began to get very warm as the bus was almost full and there was no ventilation. The bus driver left the door to the bus open which stayed that way for the rest of the trip.
The bus stopped at Vashi, next to the bus stand beside Apna Bazaar where all the Pune bound buses stop. I exited the bus. The driver and the attendant went to look at the air-conditioning system. The driver called up for another bus. He told me that we would wait until another bus came along. Several other passengers got out and started shouting at the driver. At that point an attendant from another Neeta Volvo that was parked alongside stopped by. He said that there was a bus waiting for us at Lonavala and we would have to go there and change buses. He told the other bus attendant to break the two hatches in the
ceiling and continue. His manners and expression were not convincing. He seemed merely to be trying to gherao us from point to point.
At this point, I should mention some features of the bus. The two hatches which should typically be escape hatches for people to get out in case of a fire were sealed. The rear one was sealed by a wooden board. The front one was a fibre-glass hatch with rubber sealing the edges. There was no other fire-exit in the entire bus. Usually in buses, the rear window or a side window or two serves as a fire-exit; In several of the AC buses that I have seen, a rear hatch is present in the ceiling of the bus. In this particular Volvo, both the hatches were sealed. The bus was a death trap if it caught fire.
The bus continued its journey. After another half hour it was broiling in the bus. It was 7.45 am and the sun was up. Soon we found ourselves stuck in a traffic jam on the approach to the toll booths of the Expressway. The windows of the bus were very warm to touch. Several of the kids were beginning to cry.
Most o[censored]s were exhausted from the heat. We passed the toll booth and got on the expressway. Several passengers had begun calling up the Neeta Volvo agents who sold them the bus tickets. The Neeta Volvo agents to a man claimed that it wasn't their responsibility. In fact the one single thing that every single person who worked for Neeta Volvo claimed from the first moment to the end of the trip was that the problem was not theirs. And there was another surprise. A Neeta Volvo representative at Lonavala claimed that there was no bus available to the driver and he would have to continue to Pune in the same bus. When the bus driver told us that, several passengers in the bus exploded. They warned the driver that there had better be a new AC bus or they would have to refund the money. Several of them also told the Neeta Volvo representative at Lonavla the same on the phone. To this, the representative replied that the bus breaking down was not his problem. This line of argument - wherein the Neeta Volvo employees denied any responsibility for the bus's condition or the passengers comfort - was repeated time and time again throughout the journey.
At this point, we had some relief. Two passengers (not the attendant who was instructed to do it) broke the rear hatch. As it was merely taped down and made of wood, they were able to do so easily. The front hatch was not possible to break without tools. With the back hatch open, there was cross-ventilation between the door and the hatch and it began to get cool.
We arrived at Neeta Inn at Lonavla at 8.45 am. On exiting the bus, most o[censored]s went straight to the front desk to ask about the new bus. The representative hemmed and hawed and said that there was no bus. We told him that we would not continue in the same bus and we wanted a refund. He told us we would get a Rs. 50 refund. At this point, all of the passengers vociferously demanded that we wanted a complete refund or nothing at all. A Neeta representative, a rotund man with hennaed hair, came forward and said that they would fix the bus. He went with several of the Neeta attendants who were hanging around and opened the rear door where the battery was. After a few minutes he came back claiming the bus was fixed and we should get on. But the few o[censored]s who entered the bus saw the AC was still not working. We refused to step into the bus. The rotund man told us that he would not refund the money nor would he give us any new bus to travel as he had made no promises to do so. We told him that it was Neeta's responsibility to see that the bus was working and not our's.
At this point a brand new Mercedes bus was parked in the area next to our bus. Two of the women from our bus jumped on it and shouted that we would take this bus to our destination. Nearly all the remaining passengers followed. A few with heavy luggage stood outside the bus. This was a shock to the Neeta representatives. The Mercedes was clean, airy, with working air-conditioning, lighting and fire-exits, and much more comfortable than our bus. What followed was a series of events that was unexpected but[protected] A passenger honked the horn to gain their attention and three Neeta Volvo representatives asked him to come outside in a threatening manner. We collectively demanded they come inside as none o[censored]s would come outside. In an act of pettiness, the rotund man asked one of the attendants to reach in through a side door and turn off the engine so that the AC wouldn't work. But even after stopping the AC nobody wanted to get off. Tempers were running high among the Neeta representatives as several passengers of that Mercedes bus were demanding that they be allowed to get onto that bus and the Neeta Volvo employees threw up their hands.
At that moment, three o[censored]s went down and spoke directly to the rotund man. He told us he would give us a 50% refund and let us take the bus to Pune. I told him that a ticket from Borivili to Pune cost less than a 70 Rs for an ST bus, so I had no reason to demand anything less than 250 back from them. He told me to round it off to Rs. 200. I agreed and told him to come aboard the bus and distribute the money first. He demanded we vacate the bus and return to our original bus whereupon he would hand over the money in exchange for the tickets. We refused initially but I put it to the rest of the passengers that we do as he asks and if he fails to keep his word, we simply occupy a new bus. They agreed.
Once on the bus, they returned Rs. 200 to each passenger and took back our slips. We were overjoyed to have gotten some refund after the horrific treatment meted out to us. Once back on the highway, the bus was cool due to the cross-ventilation and we arrived at Pune without any further mishaps.
The day's events led me to observe the following -
a) Neeta Volvo cares nothing for their passengers safety or welfare. The bus was a death-trap - a fire-trap with no escape except for the exit. With the faulty electrical system and the broken down AC, an electrical fire was a possibility. Yet almost no one on the bus notice this nor did any Neeta employee care.
b) Neeta's attitude was one of callous grasping heavyhandedness. When faced with the possibility that they had two buses of angry passengers and that a brand new bus had been taken over by non-violent disobedient passengers, they cowed and back-pedaled on their position and semi-caved in to our demands.
c) There was no alternative bus made available to the passengers nor was a single attempt made to provide an alternative bus. Neeta's response was indicative of their assumption that if the passengers were taken in by their promises, Neeta would not need to actually fulfil those promises once most of the journey was covered.
d) The attitude of the staff was ubiquitiously decietful and slothful. No one from Neeta offered any solution or relief nor made an honest attempt to refund our money.
e) We were overcharged and given the excuse that it was a season price. Yet a mere Rs. 50 was offered as a refund initially. The price-gouging that takes place even after passengers are assured on the Neeta's website of a fixed lower rate is illegal.
I have made a decision to never travel by Neeta Volvo again. I would not risk my life nor disturb my mental equilibrium by travelling with them. I will support the State Transport system even if it involves a little bit more travel or effort. I will also make every attempt to discourage anyone I know from travelling by Neeta Volvo.
Aug 13, 2020
Complaint marked as Resolved 
