Bhubaneswar, Feb 5: Technology-driven, citizen friendly Mo bus service of The Capital Region Urban Transport (CRUT), an Odisha government initiative was highly lauded at the inaugural session of Training cum Workshop on ‘Sustainable Public Transport for Odisha’ in Bhubaneswar on Wednesday.

Speaking on the occasion, Pratap Jena, Minister for Panchayati Raj & Drinking Water, Law, Housing& Urban Development said Mo Bus model should be emulated throughout the State specially in OSRTC (Odisha State Road Transport Corporation) and other SPVs (Special Purpose Vehicle).

“It is one of the most successful project of Bhubaneswar Smart City Project. All SPVs should learn from CRUT. I congratulate the hard working team at CRUT who had been constantly working towards excellence. It is commendable that they achieved more than 1.30 lakh ridership in a day within such a short span of time.”

The two day long SMART-SUT Mobilogues is being organised by CRUT in association withGIZ (German Corporation for International Cooperation), India. Public Transport experts from Germany, Hong Kong and India are participating in the workshop. Ithas been designed to strengthen and develop capacities of all the agencies in Odisha that are directly involved in the planning and provision of public transport services in the state.

Speaking at the inaugural session Shri ArunBothra, Managing Director, CRUT said, “Mo Bus graph is constantly going up. Credit for this goes to the riders who have trusted us from the beginning of service and give us constant feedback for improvement. We aim to reach 1.50 lakh ridership within next six months.” He further added that Mo Bus is a service for the people while making an endeavour to minimize the carbon footprints. Around 120 officials of SPVs including CRUT and OSRTC are participating in the programme which will conclude on Thursday