Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation (GSRTC) operated more than 8,000 additional bus trips using around 2,400 extra buses to manage the Diwali travel rush across Gujarat. The additional services ran alongside regular schedules to meet the sharp increase in demand during the festive period.
Thousands of passengers were heading to their hometowns for Diwali, and major bus depots in Ahmedabad, Surat and other parts of Gujarat saw heavy passenger traffic during the festive period. The corporation stepped up services to ensure that travellers could reach home without long waits at crowded depots.
The Ahmedabad division operated 1,800 additional trips from November 2 to manage the festive rush. The extra trips from Ahmedabad formed a large share of the statewide operation and covered routes that see the heaviest festive traffic each year.
Extra connectivity was added on routes linking Ahmedabad and Surat with Saurashtra, Kutch, north Gujarat and central Gujarat. These corridors carry large numbers of people travelling home for the festival, and the additional buses were meant to keep waiting times down on the busiest stretches.
Extra buses across regions
Additional buses were deployed on routes connecting Sanand, Botad, Amreli, Junagadh, Rajkot and Bhuj. The deployment spread the extra capacity across Saurashtra and Kutch, where demand rises sharply as families travel home for Diwali.
Special arrangements were also made for passengers travelling to Dahod, Godhra, Balasinor and Santrampur. These routes serve towns in eastern Gujarat, and the corporation added services there so that passengers in smaller centres also had enough options during the rush.
From Surat, additional services ran towards Saurashtra, Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Vadodara, Mehsana, Patan and Palanpur. Surat is one of the state's busiest departure points during Diwali, with large numbers of workers and families travelling to their native places, and the extra services covered the main destinations from the city.
According to a GSRTC official, additional buses are kept ready for deployment at short notice depending on passenger traffic on individual routes. The on-the-spot deployment system lets officials respond to crowd levels beyond the pre-planned schedule, sending buses where queues are building up rather than sticking rigidly to the timetable.
The additional services aim to ease congestion at major bus depots and give more travel options to passengers returning home for Diwali. With regular services continuing alongside the extra trips, the corporation sought to keep the festive movement of people smooth across the state.
