On Saturday, a senior minister in the Himanta Biswa Sarma government rode a city bus from Downtown to Kachari to make a first-hand inquiry into various problems faced by Guwahati's commuters. It coincided with a sizable number of privately-owned city buses remaining off the roads following some issues with the Transport department. The exact experience the minister gathered during his city bus ride is not known. While it is understandable that the minister could identify a number of problems involved in a city bus ride, it would have been more fruitful had he taken the ride in disguise as a common citizen, during which he would have had a better opportunity to see for himself what kind of trials and tribulations citizens have to go through every day while commuting in city buses to their respective workplaces and back, as also while taking the city bus on other work. Though the minister must have observed, it is pertinent to first and foremost point out that city buses in Guwahati, irrespective of whether one is owned by the government or by a private individual, do not maintain any time schedule. Next comes the discomfort people - especially the elderly, children and women – face while boarding and alighting because the steps of most private city buses are pretty high. The third is the cleanliness factor. Very few privately-owned city buses are cleaned and sanitized on a regular basis. Fourth is the behaviour of the city bus employees, particularly the conductor and handyman. Most of them use abusive and filthy language, which causes immense discomfort to the commuters. Commuters will agree, city bus drivers often smoke bidis and cigarettes while driving or while a bus is in a stationary position at a stoppage. Yet another issue is that city buses, whether government or private, do not always stop at the designated stops, and invariably park at non-designated spaces. This leads to traffic jams. It is not known whether the particular city bus which the minister took had entered into a competition with another bus during that particular trip. But there will hardly be any Guwahatian who will deny having had a harrowing time as two city buses compete between them and drive recklessly, often not giving enough time for the commuters to board or alight. And all this takes place at the risk of the lives of the commuters. Last, but not least, not all city buses run the entire length of their respective designated routes all the time. Many city buses cut short their trip on the plea that there are no passengers. This is not done in civilized cities.