Not only Film Stars; Even Politicians Own Hi-Tech Buses

BENGALURU: The political campaigning with leaders standing in the upright position and addressing the audience never seems to be ending. Moreover, politicians travel around places for public meetings and gatherings. While traveling, the parties always make sure that their leaders enjoy utmost comfort. What if its the Chief Minister of a large state?

As per the economic times, reading the below mentioned information will let you know about the top-class personal vehicles used by Chief Ministers.

The Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav owns a refurbished Mercedes ‘Rath’ worth 2 crore.  The bus is built by a Chandigarh- based company JCBL, which had earlier designed a mine-proof and bullet proof bus for Andra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu as well as his counterpart K Chandrashekar Rao. The red Mercedes rath has a hydraulic lift that will zip the Chief Minister to the roof to address the crowd.  To address the public, a public address system is also included along with the collections of campaigning songs played during the rath yatra.

While the Chief Minister of UP campaigns in Mercedes, Rahul Gandhi, on the other hand, used Rs 1 crore Isuzu luxury bus, designed and refurbished by Dileep Chhabaria’s DC. The congress decided to take the campaigning forward on the bus and is likely to use in the upcoming yatra in Punjab. When traveling travel in the most comfortable way, with this thought in mind, BJP is using four re-modelled Eicher Skyline tourist buses worth 25 lakhs each for its Parivarthan yatras.

On the contrary, BJP general secretary Bhupendra Yadav claimed that the buses were on rent and were “prepared by our Karyakartas” and blamed UP Chief Minister for traveling executive class in a Mercedez rath while presenting it as “Yatra of Simplicity”.

Looking at the interior of the buses, it’s not less than a luxury hotel.  The air-conditioned bus has two compartments one as normal sitting area and the other a zone to relax fitted with couches. Even if you are hungry, you don’t need to step out; there is a refrigerator and an oven to grab quick meals. Need an entertainment, no worries. The buses are mounted with LED’s and a satellite dish to keep them informed about the news. To carry out a meeting while traveling, there is nothing better than the bus with a conference section.

The cost of the refurbished bus can vary from Rs 90 lakh to 1.5 crore completely depending on the facilities. Rahul Gandhi had also used a Force Mini-Bus equipped with Sky roof during his road shows in UP.

"We got a blank bus chassis from Mercedes and completely customized it," JCBL's managing director Rishi Aggarwal told ET about Yadav's bus. The media reports stated that the refurbished bus was priced at Rs 5 crore but Aggarwal believes the cost would have exceeded Rs 5 crore, while the party sources claimed that the cost of the bus was about Rs 2 crore.

"The cost of the bus we made for Chandrababu Naidu was 5 crore as it was mine-proof and bullet-proof," Aggarwal concludes.

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