Almost half of 255 buses, imported by Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation (BRTC) from Daewoo company of South Korea, have been lying inoperative for long.
The situation has forced the state-owned bus operator to seek Korea's support for their repair and maintenance.
Officials said as the BRTC lacks expertise to repair these buses, it has sought both financial and technical support from the Korean agency that bankrolled the procurement of these buses.
Following their introduction, sources said, a good number of buses started showing signs of trouble within a short time.
Sources said many of these imported buses -- both air conditioned (AC) and non-AC -- went out of order as they were operating on long routes instead of ones in Dhaka city. Now those buses have been lying idle for long due to lack of local expertise to repair those and non-availability of spare parts, they added.
The BRTC bought 255 buses from Daewoo International Corporation at a cost of US$ 29.9 million in 2012 under a $30 million fund provided by the Economic Development Cooperation Fund (EDCF) of South Korea. The import included 150 AC and 105 non-AC buses and spare parts.
The BRTC decided to add CNG-run buses to its fleet to reduce operating costs as it had been incurring huge losses. The Daewoo buses were responsible for causing enough losses as those consumed substantial volume of liquid fuel.
However, 275 CNG-run buses imported by BRTC from China also had gone out of order within months after their launching.
Sources said due to 'corruption and forgery' by a section of BRTC officials and staff, these buses could hardly operate on the streets properly.
Meanwhile, Korea has come forward with a proposal of extending a sum of US$400,000 to carry out repair and maintenance of Daewoo buses.
A meeting in this regard was held on Thursday at the Economic Relations Division where decision was taken to impart training to BRTC technicians for carrying out maintenance and repair work of Daewoo buses. A portion of the fund will be kept for training and the rest will be used for buying spare parts.
