A new life for two Mumbai double-deckers at Karnataka museum

While the open-deck tourist double-decker has already reached Manjusha Museum, the regular red one is on the way.

Saved! Two Mumbai double-decker buses have been saved from the scrapyard. The buses are going to Karnataka's Manjusha Museum that houses over 8,000 artefacts including pre-historic relics, original manuscripts, statues, musical instruments, vehicles, paintings, and cinematography.

The museum is situated in the holy town of Dharmasthala. The museum team had approached former MLA and Shiv Sena leader Krishna Hegde, who got in touch with the BEST Undertaking's top brass and procured the buses for the museum after proper payment.

"One regular old double-decker red bus and an open-deck tourist bus will be the pride of Manjusha Museum at Dharmasthala. While the open-deck bus has reached there, the second bus is being towed all the way to the museum. The buses have been bought after proper payment for about R12 lakh (R5 lakh for the open-deck bus and R7 lakh for the double-decker)," Hegde told mid-day.

The double-decker buses were introduced in Bombay in 1937 to cope with the growing number of passengers. mid-day's coverage on the BEST lining up 900 buses for the scrapyard saw large-scale feedback and emotional outburst from citizens, with the issue trending on social media.

The BEST Undertaking has now called for tenders for 100 automatic transmission Bharat Standard VI class, non-AC new double decker buses with power-operated doors.