Technical education :

Practical training in school

Suraj A. Bandara

The Transport Ministry will promote technical education among schoolchildren by supplying a bus with an operative engine and gear box for a selected school in each zonal education division, Transport Deputy Minister Rohana Dissanayake said.

The program is a result of recent discussions held between the Ministry and the Education Ministry officials. Already 93 schools have been selected through respective zonal education divisions by the Education Ministry for the program. In the first phase, the Transport Deputy Minister will offer a few buses for schools in the Southern region next week.

Meanwhile, the Transport Ministry in a bid to cut down Ministry's unnecessary expenditure has embarked on a bus service to measure the fuel efficiency and technical errors of the SLTB buses. This bus will comprise sophisticated machines to identify the faults and remedy the faults on the spot.

Around 50 percent of the Sri Lanka Transport Board's income is spent on fuel. Sometimes it goes up by 60 percent when buses experience severe technical faults. The SLTB has earned around Rs 1,885 million and has spent Rs 609 million on fuel. By now, around Rs 20 per kilometre is spent by the SLTB.

To minimize the fuel consumption this bus will operate in every region of the island to test whether there is technical problems or any other malpractice behind the fuel consumption.

There is an increase of fuel consumption over the recent years, the Ministry has noted. This bus will be deployed on after the Deputy Minister's tour to inspect the Southern depots, a Ministry spokesman told the Daily News.