To ensure speedy availability of good quality parts, the Association of State Road Transport Undertakings (ASRTU) wants original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) of buses to share the specifications of spare parts so that these can be directly procured.
“We are asking vehicle original equipment manufacturers to share specifications of spare parts used in the buses supplied to State transportation units,” ASRTU’s Executive Director PS Ananda Rao told Business Line .
ASRTU has written to the manufacturers on the issue. The SRTUs procure ₹2,500 crore worth of spare parts annually either directly from OEMs or other vendors. Members of ASRTU run about 150,000 buses and serve 70 million passengers everyday.
The government has a testing facility at Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT), Pune, where spare parts can be tested. “But, with the OEMs not sharing the specifications, spurious parts can get into the system. Then, if there is a problem, OEMs refuse to take any responsibility,” Rao said.
ASRTU decides the rate at which these parts can be procured by State transport undertakings. Through these, ASRTU looks to supply auto parts, bus body repair items and items of general consumption required by STUs at competitive prices. ASRTU has 500 vendors, all of which are registered under the Goods and Services Tax.
As of now, tenders are invited as per ASRTU specifications, and in absence of these some times other specifications, such as those by Bureau of Indian Standards, are adopted. The ASRTU specifications are formulated by a sub-committee with its headquarters at CIRT, Pune.
Incidentally, not just bus users, but car users too face issues related to independent spare parts. In 2015, the Competition Commission of India had indicted car-makers for not selling spare parts independently.
According to the CCI order: “The car companies were found to be indulging in practices resulting in denial of market access to independent repairers as the latter were debilitated to provide services in the aftermarket for repair and maintenance of cars for want of genuine spare parts. Further, these car companies were also found to be using their dominant position in the market for spare parts and diagnostic tools to protect their market for repair services, thereby distorting fair competition.”