General secretary of West Bengal Bus and Minibus Owners’ Association Pradip Narayan Bose said public transport facilities would be withdrawn in the state between March 18 and 20.

The operators demanded that the tenure of stage carriages, set to cross the 15-year time frame by 2024, be extended by another two years.

“We have made a justified demand as our buses were mostly off the roads due to the Covid and lockdown during in 2020-2022 and both employees and owners went through serious financial crisis,” Tapan Bandyopadhyay of Joint Council of Bus Syndicate said.

Bose claimed that representatives of bus operators went to the transport department office during the day after giving notice, but neither the minister nor any other senior official were present to hear their views. “We have given them time till March 15 to think about our just demands,” he said.