New Delhi, Nov 18 (IANS) Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader V.K. Malhotra Wednesday wrote to Delhi Metro Chief E. Sreedharan suggesting measures for improvement in Delhi Metro services which according to him has made the 'experience of riding on them worse than Blueline buses'.

In the letter he said that 'while the Metro has brought a lot of relief to citizens of Delhi and has been a boon to many, the growing numbers of passengers in the Delhi Metro has made the experience of riding on them worse than Blueline Buses.

'The Metro is so crowded that it has become difficult to get inside it without struggle and even if one manages to get in, the crowded coach makes it impossible to have a comfortable journey. The lag time between two trains has also increased leading to greater waiting time for passengers and therefore to more passengers per coach,' Malhotra, who is also the leader of opposition in Delhi Assembly, wrote in the letter.

He said that when the metro project was initiated it was claimed that in the event of any fault in the system, passengers would be evacuated immediately and the service resumed within three minutes.

'However, only a few weeks back a technical snag held up passengers at on the Jehangirpuri-Central Secretariat line for almost 12 minutes while those on the Rajiv Chowk-Dwarka line suffered for 45 minutes before resumption of service. Apart from this, we have been hearing of one or the other technical issue every two days or so in the Metro service,' he added.

He further said: 'At the time of inception the Metro was reported to be making a turnover of Rs. 9 million per day. Since the Metro fares were increased it was assumed that the turnover would rise to Rs 12.4 million per day. We are now informed from newspaper sources that the actual income is close to Rs 16.4 million daily. It is clear therefore that there has been substantial increase in Metro traffic ever since.'

To make the Metro system more efficient and user-friendly to commuters, Malhotra suggested some measures.

He suggested an increase in the number of coaches, increase in the number of trains per destination, public conveniences outside the major Metro stations and effective qualified steps to reduce recovery time from technical snags.

He also suggested an increase in frequency of trains to reduce waiting time between the two trains.

- Indo-Asian News Service

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