UPSRTC’s e-buses: New proposal made on Centre’s directions

Following the central government’s order to convert all state buses to electric buses in order to make cities pollution-free, especially those running on interstate and intercity routes, the UP State Road Transport Corporation (UPSRTC) has announced plans to purchase electric buses starting with seven major cities of Uttar Pradesh.
While so far, 14 major routes of U.P. had electric buses running on them, the SRTC and the urban development department are jointly creating a proposal to purchase buses for all intercity routes in the state. The first phase of the conversion will include Lucknow, Varanasi, Agra, Prayagraj, Mathura and Gorakhpur.
“We are preparing a proposal for purchasing e-buses for intercity travel within U.P,” said Amrit Abhijat, principal secretary, urban development department.
Further, regional manager of SRTC, Lucknow, RK Tripathi said, “We are also considering purchasing e-autos on a PPP (public private partnership) model for making intra-city travel pollution free as well.”
Additionally, the Centre’s new Pradhan Mantri E-bus Seva scheme is also set to provide the state with 1950 electric buses, in the following districts – Shahjahanpur, Lucknow, Moradabad, Aligarh, Bareilly, Jhansi, Noida, Ayodhya and Meerut.
As for the buses to be purchased by the state – 450 new buses will be added to the fleets assigned to Lucknow (100 buses), Varanasi (100) buses, Agra (75), Prayagraj (75), Gorakhpur (50), Ayodhya (50).
Despite the various plans to electrify the state bus fleet in 2023, the UPSRTC fleet currently has less than 250 electric buses to its name. Having promised 120 new electric buses to join the fleet in September this year, and more plans of replacing 45% of the state’s fleet with electric buses (UPSRTC owned and contracted vehicles combined), which is almost 5000 buses, these plans have seen no fruition in the state so far.
Ajit Singh, technical manager, UPSRTC, has said that tenders have been floated for the purchase of e-buses and certain companies have been narrowed down for partnership. However, “The new buses have not come into the possession of the Corporation yet, as the manufacture and handover process tends to take some time.”