Most of these buses, to be inducted on Wednesday, are vehicles taken on lease from private operators. Other buses will be the ones procured from funds provided by the Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporations. Also, the first bus procured under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) funds, from the central and state governments, will also be inducted into the fleet said PMPML chairman and managing director Nitin Khade.

Incidentally, the procurement of 650 buses under the JNNURM has already been delayed because of the controversy over the ownership of these vehicles and whether they would be plied under public-private partnership basis. The long drawn controversy ended just a couple of weeks ago after the PMPML board of directors resolved that the buses will be owned by the PMPML body and not by any private operator.

It was last year that the PMPML had procured new buses, just before the Commonwealth Youth Games held in October. In February, the Central government had sanctioned 650 buses for the Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad cities under the JNNURM. These buses were supposed to be inducted in the fleet before June, but the PMPML is yet to float tenders for these vehicles.