A demand for an Economic Offences Wing investigation into the BEST Chalo app’s billing system has brought Mumbai’s bus-ticketing technology contract under scrutiny, with a BEST committee member alleging that the undertaking may be paying for more users than the app records. Chalo has rejected the charge, saying its contract covers ticketing hardware, crew planning and revenue reconciliation across all payment modes.
BEST committee member Ajay Singh raised the issue at a committee meeting on Thursday and sought a probe by the Mumbai Police’s EOW. According to the allegation reported by the Times of India, around 22 lakh passengers travel on BEST buses each day, while approximately 2 lakh actively use the Chalo app. Singh alleged that payments to the operator were instead being calculated on the basis of 30 lakh commuters.
At a rate of 13 paise per ticket for 30 lakh passengers, Singh calculated that the operator would receive nearly Rs 3.90 lakh a day. He put the resulting payment at about Rs 1.17 crore a month and Rs 14.23 crore a year, and questioned the use of public funds for a user base he said was substantially larger than the number of active app users.
The allegation centres on how the contract defines the service being paid for. Singh’s account links the payment to the number of commuters using the app, while Chalo said the agreement is not limited to digital ticket users. The company said its scope includes technology deployment for every ticket issued, crew planning and revenue reconciliation across all payment modes.
Chalo also said hardware had been deployed across 3,300 buses when ridership was 30 lakh, and that this figure formed the contract’s minimum guarantee. The company described the provision as a standard term in agreements involving State Transport Undertakings. It further said BEST had paid significantly more per ticket before its system was introduced.
The company disputed the claim that only 2 lakh commuters use its platform. Chalo said more than 50% of BEST commuters use its platform and that ticket issuance inside buses has reached 100%. It also said the project had received several national awards and was regarded as a benchmark model among State Transport Undertakings.
The dispute therefore involves two separate measures of performance: active use of the Chalo app by passengers and the wider technology system used to issue and reconcile BEST tickets. The available report does not establish whether the payments in question were calculated incorrectly or whether the alleged figures reflect the contractual minimum guarantee. Those questions are central to any examination of the contract and its billing records.
The demand for an EOW probe now places the matter before the relevant authorities for consideration. The next steps would depend on whether BEST or the Mumbai Police orders an investigation and on the records used to determine the operator’s payments, including the tender terms, ticket volumes and reconciliation data.
