Launch of Delhi e-buses put off due to mourning for Pope
NEW DELHI: The city government postponed the launch of the Delhi Electric Vehicle Interchanges (DEVI) on Tuesday following the Centre's declaration of national mourning in the wake of the passing of Pope Francis.
The Delhi Transport Department officials said the inauguration will be announced with a revised date soon. DEVI buses, which were earlier proposed to be named 'Mohalla Buses' by the previous AAP government, will soon hit the road. These buses were undergoing trial runs on half a dozen routes over the past few months.
In its first phase, 76 buses will be operated from three depots — Nangli, East Vinod Nagar, and Ghazipur. Each bus is designed to seat 23 passengers, with an additional standing capacity for 13 individuals.
Importantly, six seats will be reserved for women, and 25 per cent of the total seating will be made available free of cost under the Delhi government's Pink Pass scheme, aimed at encouraging safer and more affordable travel for women.
The buses are powered by a battery system comprising six battery packs with a combined energy capacity of 196 kWh. A full charge can be completed in 45 minutes, providing a driving range of up to 200 km— sufficient for a full day's operations within city limits. The first operational route under the DEVI scheme, labelled MS-1, is planned to connect Akshardham Metro Station with the Mayur Vihar Phase-3 Paper Market. Key stops along this corridor include densely populated residential and commercial zones such as Trilokpuri, Kalyanpuri, and Ghazipur, offering much-needed connectivity to underserved areas.
The fare structure will mirror that of the capital's existing fleet of air-conditioned buses, with tickets priced at Rs 10, Rs 15, Rs 20, and Rs 25 depending on the distance travelled.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
India Gazette
3 days ago
- India Gazette
Delhi government to set up unified metropolitan transport authority; cabinet proposal likely by end of this month
By Tanya Chugh New Delhi [India], June 7 (ANI): The Delhi government is planning to set up UMTA (Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority) to improve public transport in the state. The aim is to have better coordination among public transport agencies. It further aims to improve public transport coordination and project implementation, to streamline the public transport system by facilitating better communication and cooperation between different transport agencies. The Transport Department may present a Cabinet proposal regarding this plan by the end of this month, said top sources. The Transport Department is currently working on the entire plan. In addition, consultations are being held with the Pollution Control Board, Traffic Police, the Finance Department, and the Urban Development Department. The UMTA would act as a coordinating body which would manage and improve the public transport in the state. If the plan gets approval, it would facilitate communication and collaboration between various transport agencies to ensure a more integrated and efficient system. To enhance the public transport infrastructure, Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) had previously issued a new SOP. Under this, the faulty buses will be removed within 15 minutes. Cranes and Quick Response Teams (QRTs) at 30 key locations across Delhi have been deployed by DTC that monitor function to remove the faulty buses. Also, DTC has started with a new project where it aims to generate Rs 2600 crores after its depots become commercial hubs. The decision came in a bid to rescue the continuously loss-making Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC). Approvals have been granted for the redevelopment of Banda Bahadur Marg and Sukhdev Vihar depots, a top source to ANI. New electric buses DEVi, Delhi Electric Vehicle Interconnector, have also been launched by the government. A fleet of 200 new buses was flagged off by PM Narendra Modi in the national capital on 5th June on the occasion of World Environment Day. (ANI)
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
4 days ago
- Business Standard
Can American pope bring US-style fundraising to fix Vatican finances?
As a bishop in Peru, Robert Prevost was often on the lookout for used cars that he could buy cheap and fix up himself for use in parishes around his diocese. With cars that were really broken down, he'd watch YouTube videos to learn how to fix them. That kind of make-do-with-less, fix-it-yourself mentality could serve Pope Leo XIV well as he addresses one of the greatest challenges facing him as pope: The Holy See's chronic, 50 million to 60 million euro ($57-68 million) structural deficit, 1 billion euro ($1.14 billion) pension fund shortfall and declining donations that together pose something of an existential threat to the central government of the 1.4-billion strong Catholic Church. As a Chicago-born math major, canon lawyer and two-time superior of his global Augustinian religious order, the 69-year-old pope presumably can read a balance sheet and make sense of the Vatican's complicated finances, which have long been mired in scandal. Whether he can change the financial culture of the Holy See, consolidate reforms Pope Francis started and convince donors that their money is going to good use is another matter. Leo already has one thing going for him: his American-ness. US donors have long been the economic life support system of the Holy See, financing everything from papal charity projects abroad to restorations of St Peter's Basilica at home. Leo's election as the first American pope has sent a jolt of excitement through US Catholics, some of whom had soured on donating to the Vatican after years of unrelenting stories of mismanagement, corruption and scandal, according to interviews with top Catholic fundraisers, philanthropists and church management experts. I think the election of an American is going to give greater confidence that any money given is going to be cared for by American principles, especially of stewardship and transparency, said the Rev. Roger Landry, director of the Vatican's main missionary fundraising operation in the US, the Pontifical Mission Societies. So there will be great hope that American generosity is first going to be appreciated and then secondly is going to be well handled, he said. That hasn't always been the circumstance, especially lately. Reforms and unfinished business Pope Francis was elected in 2013 on a mandate to reform the Vatican's opaque finances and made progress during his 12-year pontificate, mostly on the regulatory front. With help from the late Australian Cardinal George Pell, Francis created an economy ministry and council made up of clergy and lay experts to supervise Vatican finances, and he wrestled the Italian-dominated bureaucracy into conforming to international accounting and budgetary standards. He authorized a landmark, if deeply problematic, corruption trial over a botched London property investment that convicted a once-powerful Italian cardinal. And he punished the Vatican's Secretariat of State that had allowed the London deal to go through by stripping it of its ability to manage its own assets. But Francis left unfinished business and his overall record, at least according to some in the donor community, is less than positive. Critics cite Pell's frustrated reform efforts and the firing of the Holy See's first-ever auditor general, who says he was ousted because he had uncovered too much financial wrongdoing. Despite imposing years of belt-tightening and hiring freezes, Francis left the Vatican in somewhat dire financial straits: The main stopgap bucket of money that funds budgetary shortfalls, known as the Peter's Pence, is nearly exhausted, officials say. The 1 billion euro (USD1.14 billion) pension fund shortfall that Pell warned about a decade ago remains unaddressed, though Francis had planned reforms. And the structural deficit continues, with the Holy See logging an 83.5 million euro ($95 million) deficit in 2023, according to its latest financial report. As Francis' health worsened, there were signs that his efforts to reform the Vatican's medieval financial culture hadn't really stuck, either. The very same Secretariat of State that Francis had punished for losing tens of millions of euros in the scandalous London property deal somehow ended up heading up a new papal fundraising commission that was announced while Francis was in the hospital. According to its founding charter and statutes, the commission is led by the Secretariat of State's assessor, is composed entirely of Italian Vatican officials with no professional fundraising expertise and has no required external financial oversight. To some Vatican watchers, the commission smacks of the Italian-led Secretariat of State taking advantage of a sick pope to announce a new flow of unchecked donations into its coffers after its 600 million euro ($684 million) sovereign wealth fund was taken away and given to another office to manage as punishment for the London fiasco. There are no Americans on the commission. I think it would be good if there were representatives of Europe and Asia and Africa and the United States on the commission, said Ward Fitzgerald, president of the US-based Papal Foundation. It is made up of wealthy American Catholics that since 1990 has provided over $250 million (219 million euros) in grants and scholarships to the pope's global charitable initiatives. Fitzgerald, who spent his career in real estate private equity, said American donors especially the younger generation expect transparency and accountability from recipients of their money, and know they can find non-Vatican Catholic charities that meet those expectations. We would expect transparency before we would start to solve the problem, he said. That said, Fitzgerald said he hadn't seen any significant let-up in donor willingness to fund the Papal Foundation's project-specific donations during the Francis pontificate. Indeed, US donations to the Vatican overall have remained more or less consistent even as other countries' offerings declined, with US bishops and individual Catholics contributing more than any other country in the two main channels to donate to papal causes. A head for numbers and background fundraising Francis moved Prevost to take over the diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, in 2014. Residents and fellow priests say he consistently rallied funds, food and other life-saving goods for the neediest experience that suggests he knows well how to raise money when times are tight and how to spend wisely. He bolstered the local Caritas charity in Chiclayo, with parishes creating food banks that worked with local businesses to distribute donated food, said the Rev. Fidel Purisaca Vigil, a diocesan spokesperson. In 2019, Prevost inaugurated a shelter on the outskirts of Chiclayo, Villa San Vicente de Paul, to house desperate Venezuelan migrants who had fled their country's economic crisis. The migrants remember him still, not only for helping give them and their children shelter, but for bringing live chickens obtained from a donor. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Prevost launched a campaign to raise funds to build two oxygen plants to provide hard-hit residents with life-saving oxygen. In 2023, when massive rains flooded the region, he personally brought food to the flood-struck zone. Within hours of his May 8 election, videos went viral on social media of Prevost, wearing rubber boots and standing in a flooded street, pitching a solidarity campaign, Peru Give a Hand, to raise money for flood victims. The Rev. Jorge Milln, who lived with Prevost and eight other priests for nearly a decade in Chiclayo, said he had a mathematical mentality and knew how to get the job done. Prevost would always be on the lookout for used cars to buy for use around the diocese, Milln said, noting that the bishop often had to drive long distances to reach all of his flock or get to Lima, the capital. Prevost liked to fix them up himself, and if he didn't know what to do, he'd look up solutions on YouTube and very often he'd find them, Milln told The Associated Press. Before going to Peru, Prevost served two terms as prior general, or superior, of the global Augustinian order. While the order's local provinces are financially independent, Prevost was responsible for reviewing their balance sheets and oversaw the budgeting and investment strategy of the order's headquarters in Rome, said the Rev. Franz Klein, the order's Rome-based economist who worked with Prevost. The Augustinian campus sits on prime real estate just outside St. Peter's Square and supplements revenue by renting out its picturesque terrace to media organizations (including the AP) for major Vatican events, including the conclave that elected Leo pope. But even Prevost saw the need for better fundraising, especially to help out poorer provinces. Toward the end of his 12-year term and with his support, a committee proposed creation of a foundation, Augustinians in the World. At the end of 2023, it had 994,000 euros ($1.13 million) in assets and was helping fund self-sustaining projects across Africa, including a centre to rehabilitate former child soldiers in Congo. He has a very good interest and also a very good feeling for numbers, Klein said. I have no worry about the finances of the Vatican in these years because he is very, very clever.
Time of India
4 days ago
- Time of India
Can an American pope apply US-style fundraising and standards to fix troubled Vatican finances?
As a bishop in Peru, Robert Prevost was often on the lookout for used cars that he could buy cheap and fix up himself for use in parishes around his diocese. With cars that were really broken down, he'd watch YouTube videos to learn how to fix them. That kind of make-do-with-less, fix-it-yourself mentality could serve Pope Leo XIV well as he addresses one of the greatest challenges facing him as pope: The Holy See's chronic, 50 million to 60 million euro ($57-68 million) structural deficit, 1 billion euro ($1.14 billion) pension fund shortfall and declining donations that together pose something of an existential threat to the central government of the 1.4-billion strong Catholic Church . As a Chicago-born math major, canon lawyer and two-time superior of his global Augustinian religious order, the 69-year-old pope presumably can read a balance sheet and make sense of the Vatican's complicated finances, which have long been mired in scandal. Whether he can change the financial culture of the Holy See, consolidate reforms Pope Francis started and convince donors that their money is going to good use is another matter. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Promoções imperdíveis de voos baratos Voos | Anúncios de Pesquisa Saiba Mais Undo Leo already has one thing going for him: his American-ness. US donors have long been the economic life support system of the Holy See, financing everything from papal charity projects abroad to restorations of St. Peter's Basilica at home. Leo's election as the first American pope has sent a jolt of excitement through US. Catholics, some of whom had soured on donating to the Vatican after years of unrelenting stories of mismanagement, corruption and scandal, according to interviews with top Catholic fundraisers, philanthropists and church management experts. "I think the election of an American is going to give greater confidence that any money given is going to be cared for by American principles, especially of stewardship and transparency," said the Rev. Roger Landry, director of the Vatican's main missionary fundraising operation in the US, the Pontifical Mission Societies. Live Events You Might Also Like: Whoops, waves, tears: Faithful react to Pope Leo's first Sunday blessing in St. Peter's Square "So there will be great hope that American generosity is first going to be appreciated and then secondly is going to be well handled," he said. "That hasn't always been the circumstance, especially lately." Reforms and unfinished business Pope Francis was elected in 2013 on a mandate to reform the Vatican's opaque finances and made progress during his 12-year pontificate, mostly on the regulatory front. With help from the late Australian Cardinal George Pell , Francis created an economy ministry and council made up of clergy and lay experts to supervise Vatican finances, and he wrestled the Italian-dominated bureaucracy into conforming to international accounting and budgetary standards. He authorized a landmark, if deeply problematic, corruption trial over a botched London property investment that convicted a once-powerful Italian cardinal. And he punished the Vatican's Secretariat of State that had allowed the London deal to go through by stripping it of its ability to manage its own assets. But Francis left unfinished business and his overall record, at least according to some in the donor community, is less than positive. Critics cite Pell's frustrated reform efforts and the firing of the Holy See's first-ever auditor general, who says he was ousted because he had uncovered too much financial wrongdoing. You Might Also Like: Pope Leo XIV celebrates first Mass after historic election as Pope Francis' successor Despite imposing years of belt-tightening and hiring freezes, Francis left the Vatican in somewhat dire financial straits: The main stopgap bucket of money that funds budgetary shortfalls, known as the Peter's Pence, is nearly exhausted, officials say. The 1 billion euro ($1.14 billion) pension fund shortfall that Pell warned about a decade ago remains unaddressed, though Francis had planned reforms. And the structural deficit continues, with the Holy See logging an 83.5 million euro ($95 million) deficit in 2023, according to its latest financial report. As Francis' health worsened, there were signs that his efforts to reform the Vatican's medieval financial culture hadn't really stuck, either. The very same Secretariat of State that Francis had punished for losing tens of millions of euros in the scandalous London property deal somehow ended up heading up a new papal fundraising commission that was announced while Francis was in the hospital. According to its founding charter and statutes, the commission is led by the Secretariat of State's assessor, is composed entirely of Italian Vatican officials with no professional fundraising expertise and has no required external financial oversight. To some Vatican watchers, the commission smacks of the Italian-led Secretariat of State taking advantage of a sick pope to announce a new flow of unchecked donations into its coffers after its 600 million euro ($684 million) sovereign wealth fund was taken away and given to another office to manage as punishment for the London fiasco. "There are no Americans on the commission. I think it would be good if there were representatives of Europe and Asia and Africa and the United States on the commission," said Ward Fitzgerald, president of the U.S.-based Papal Foundation . It is made up of wealthy American Catholics that since 1990 has provided over $250 million (219 million euros) in grants and scholarships to the pope's global charitable initiatives. Fitzgerald, who spent his career in real estate private equity, said American donors - especially the younger generation - expect transparency and accountability from recipients of their money, and know they can find non-Vatican Catholic charities that meet those expectations. "We would expect transparency before we would start to solve the problem," he said. That said, Fitzgerald said he hadn't seen any significant let-up in donor willingness to fund the Papal Foundation's project-specific donations during the Francis pontificate. Indeed, U.S. donations to the Vatican overall have remained more or less consistent even as other countries' offerings declined, with U.S. bishops and individual Catholics contributing more than any other country in the two main channels to donate to papal causes. A head for numbers and background fundraising Francis moved Prevost to take over the diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, in 2014. Residents and fellow priests say he consistently rallied funds, food and other life-saving goods for the neediest - experience that suggests he knows well how to raise money when times are tight and how to spend wisely. He bolstered the local Caritas charity in Chiclayo, with parishes creating food banks that worked with local businesses to distribute donated food, said the Rev. Fidel Purisaca Vigil, a diocesan spokesperson. In 2019, Prevost inaugurated a shelter on the outskirts of Chiclayo, Villa San Vicente de Paul, to house desperate Venezuelan migrants who had fled their country's economic crisis. The migrants remember him still, not only for helping give them and their children shelter, but for bringing live chickens obtained from a donor. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Prevost launched a campaign to raise funds to build two oxygen plants to provide hard-hit residents with life-saving oxygen. In 2023, when massive rains flooded the region, he personally brought food to the flood-struck zone. Within hours of his May 8 election, videos went viral on social media of Prevost, wearing rubber boots and standing in a flooded street, pitching a solidarity campaign, "Peru Give a Hand," to raise money for flood victims. The Rev. Jorge Millan, who lived with Prevost and eight other priests for nearly a decade in Chiclayo, said he had a "mathematical" mentality and knew how to get the job done. Prevost would always be on the lookout for used cars to buy for use around the diocese, Millan said, noting that the bishop often had to drive long distances to reach all of his flock or get to Lima, the capital. Prevost liked to fix them up himself, and if he didn't know what to do, "he'd look up solutions on YouTube and very often he'd find them," Millan told The Associated Press. Before going to Peru, Prevost served two terms as prior general, or superior, of the global Augustinian order. While the order's local provinces are financially independent, Prevost was responsible for reviewing their balance sheets and oversaw the budgeting and investment strategy of the order's headquarters in Rome, said the Rev. Franz Klein, the order's Rome-based economist who worked with Prevost. The Augustinian campus sits on prime real estate just outside St. Peter's Square and supplements revenue by renting out its picturesque terrace to media organizations (including the AP) for major Vatican events, including the conclave that elected Leo pope. But even Prevost saw the need for better fundraising, especially to help out poorer provinces. Toward the end of his 12-year term and with his support, a committee proposed creation of a foundation, Augustinians in the World. At the end of 2023, it had 994,000 euros ($1.13 million) in assets and was helping fund self-sustaining projects across Africa, including a center to rehabilitate former child soldiers in Congo. "He has a very good interest and also a very good feeling for numbers," Klein said. "I have no worry about the finances of the Vatican in these years because he is very, very clever."
