PUNE: The Board of Directors (BOD) of Pune Mahanagar Parivahan Mahamandal Ltd (PMPML) has approved purchase of 1,000 CNG and electric buses within a year. The old buses will be phased out from the fleet, said Mayor Mukta Tilak.
“The BOD on Saturday approved the plan to acquire 400 new CNG run non-AC buses to add to the PMPML’s fleet. The acquisition of the buses will start from December this year and by January 15, 2019, we will have 50 buses on road. Then in a phased manner, more buses will join the fleet every month with all 400 buses getting on road by July 15, 2019,” said Tilak.
If the slated plans are completed, PMPML will have over 2,000 buses on road by end of September 2019. At present, around 1,450 buses ply on city roads, of which about 300-400 need to be phased out due to old age and bad health.
Soon after the meeting, chaired by PMPML CMD Nayana Gunde, Tilak and corporator and PMPML Director Siddharth Shirole held a press conference announcing the board’s decisions.
According to Shirole, the sanctioned budget for buying new CNG buses is 195.19 crore, of which Rs 117 crore will be given by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) while Rs 78 crore will be contributed by the Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC).
“The per unit cost of the CNG buses is worked out at Rs 48.40 lakh. The proposed 150 electrical buses will be supplied by the contractor by end of April 2019. Also, the deadline for hiring of 440 buses from private contractors has been set at September 2019. Considering all this, by September 2019, PMPML will have a fleet of over 2,000 operational buses, subtracting from the sum those needed to be scrapped, which essentially means that a city road can see a bus every five minutes,” said Shirole.
Besides Gunde,Tilak and Shirole, Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar and PCMC Standing Finance Committee Chief Mamta Gaikwad also attended the meet.
‘LOOK FOR ALTERNATIVE SOURCES TO INCREASE REVENUE’
The PMPML administration had proposed a Rs 2 per stage hike in the fare of the transport body, citing growing prices of fuel. However, the mayor said the proposal was rejected at the outset with the administration of the transport body being asked to look for alternative sources to increase revenue. “There is no plan to burden citizens with a hike. We rejected the idea at the outset. Instead, the board asked the administration to look for alternative sources to increase its income. As a public transport utility, we can’t expect PMPML to be a profit making company. However, we want to financially strengthen it so that it is less dependent on financial aid,” said Tilak.
