Sajha to Introduce its First Electric Bus

In the next two months, Sajha Yatayat plans to introduce its first electric bus. It will introduce three more in the first half of this year.

The details:

• These buses will be pilot models for the company’s public transport.
• The plan is to introduce several models to promote electric buses with support from government and non-governmental agencies.
• Public transport co-operative Bhushan Tuladhar said, “The capital expenditure to raise a fleet of e-buses may appear high, but many such buses can be bought with the tax collected per year. We have billions of unspent rupees in the fund that should be used for promoting electric public transport.”
• From 2007, the government has been charging 50 paisa per litre on diesel and petrol in order to spend the amount raised to tackle air pollution in the Valley. But the fund of around Rs. 5 billion remains idle at the Ministry of Finance.
• Talking on e-transport, Ministry of Population and Environment (MoPE) joint-secretary Ram Prasad Lamsal said, “The technologies are still expensive, but improving and getting cheaper as well. It’s not that we cannot achieve these targets. However, we must admit that we are behind so far.”