Villagers in Nedungadu panchayat demand resumption of bus services

Lack of bus service in ten villages near Karaikal town forces residents to rely on cycles for transportation.

Seventy year-old T. Rajendran was on his way back to Kottagam village on his cycle from Nedungadu Bazar located in the Nedungadu commune panchayat, which is 4 km from his village as lack of bus service gives him no other option.

Like Mr. Rajendran, several others from ten small villages in Nedungadu commune panchayat have to depend on themselves as a bus that connected them to the nearby Nedungadu bazar and Karaikal town stopped making trips since 2022.

Earlier, in 2008 after locals made repeated demands a bus connecting Karikal to Nedungadu bazar entered these ten villages within 5 km from Nedungadu bazar, including Ponpethi, Kiliyanur, Kottgam, Andoor, Usupur, Vadakattalai, Kottapakkam, Pandarvadai, Nallathur and Kurumbagaram. Several bus shelters were built in these villages for the buses to halt.

But the Puducherry Road Transport Corporation(PRTC) bus stopped operating after 2011 and then a decade later again in 2022 bus services resumed in the same route which stopped in a short while as well. Now buses come only upto the Nedungadu bazar from Karaikal town and they do not enter these villages.

“Whenever we agitate, they will suddenly send a bus but that will stop in a week. We have gotten tired of asking and no buses have come here for the past two years. To get my tablets, and to have my sugar checked I am using this cycle to reach the nearby Primary Health Centre near Nedungadu bazar” said Selvaraj.M from Kiliyanur village.

“Our children are studying in town, at least two trips per day can be given to us. Right from meeting our Village Administrative officer to other issues we have to either walk or take a cycle. Earlier that bus connected us upto Karaikal where we had an access to the district Government Hospital”, said Narayanasamy.S from Nallathur village.

“These villages are economically backward. Right from basic things like buying vegetables or going to local government offices they don’t have a public transport to access. There are four Anganwadis and four government schools at present in these villages to which outsiders from other places come to work and lack of bus makes their transportation difficult as well,” said S. Mathivannan, a social activist.