No Conflict Of Interest, Insist Experts As questions are being raised vigorously by citizens' groups, traffic experts and MPs across party lines over the controversial BRT corridor, what seems to have slipped notice is that the patrons of the IIT-Delhi department behind the concept include bus manufacturing majors Volvo and Tatas. The BRT project, which has turned the lives of thousands of south Delhi commuters into a nightmare of nerve-wracking jams, pedestrian chaos, and cycle and twowheeler tailbacks, is essentially meant to segregate traffic in a manner that provides a dedicated corridor to buses. The road space for non-bus motorized traffic has been reduced by about half. What makes the decision of the city government to appoint Dinesh Mohan and Geetam Tiwari from IIT-D's Transport Research and Injury Prevention Programme as independent experts for the project curious is that the department's patrons include Volvo Education Research Foundations (VERF) and Ford Motor Company. The experts deny any conflict of interest. They were appointed before my tenure: Haroon New Delhi: The patrons of the IITDelhi department behind the BRT concept include bus manufacturing majors Volvo and Tatas. Ford owns the Volvo brand and is one of the biggest bus manufacturing companies in the world. TRIPP's patrons also include Telco (now called Tata Motors), a major supplier of buses. Tatas are the only suppliers of low-floor buses in Delhi at present, having bagged the order for the first lot of 500 buses to be supplied to Delhi Transport Corporation. While Ford has funded a chair for the programme, both Telco and VERF have given grants. The corporate affiliations of TRIPP is no secret. It is prominently displayed on its website but despite it not being classified information, the apparent ignorance of the city government and officials is puzzling. While TRIPP is free to source its financial backing from the industry, its role in a project which specifically promotes buses as a mode of public transport can raise conflict of interest issues, all the more as the BRT backers have strenuously run down the Metro. Transport minister Haroon Yusuf, when asked about TRIPP's affiliations, said: