Boosting employment and accessibility: Investing in India's public transport sector

Public transport in India provides affordable access to mobility for two-thirds of households which don’t own a personal car or a two-wheeler. The sector also employs as many as 10 million people and hence is one of the largest creators of local jobs across the country. The coronavirus pandemic has severely impacted the public transport sector due to a prolonged shut down of operations during the lockdowns and the gradual resumption of services, starting only recently with many service providers yet to reach pre-Covid service levels.

Given the large public transport-dependent population, Indian cities need to resume pre-pandemic levels of service and take up confidence-building measures to reassure users. The public transport sector needs financial assistance from national, state and city-level governments to address the losses incurred due to Covid-19, to be able to continue providing the services needed to meet users’ requirements. Cities around the world are implementing various measures such as financial aid and contractual rearrangements to support public transport systems in their financial recovery. However, the financial support to Indian public transport systems has been limited so far.

This Policy Brief evaluates the impact of alternative transport sector investments being made by governments in India to make the case for increased investments in public transport, given
their additional benefits.

Download the Policy Brief

Interested in how we calculated the results?

Check out the data methodology annexe