BEST plans to have 1200 e-double deckers

The civicrun Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport BEST undertaking plans to have 1200 edouble deckers aims to have more than 50 per cent ebuses in fleet by 202526 reported the PTIIn a press release issued during the day the metropolis premier road transport undertaking said it has set an ambitious goal to have 100 per cent zeroemission electric bus fleet by 202627An order has been placed for 2650 singledecker electric buses it addedOn Thursday BEST general manager Anil Diggikar presented the undertakings Rs 943956 crore budget to Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation commissioner and administrator Bhushan Gagrani for 202526In the Rs 1 lakh surplus budget BESTs estimated deficit is of Rs 208633 crore as its electric supply wing is estimated to get a profit of Rs 4618 crore but the transport wing is estimated to face a deficit of Rs 213151 crore Capital expenditure for 202526 is expected to be Rs 184924 crore while showing an expected Rs 281203 crore grant from its parent BMC during the financial year the release said according to the PTIBEST needs Rs 67951 crore for filling the gap in its capital expenditure the release pointed outCurrently BEST has a fleet of 3166 buses including 2081 hired vehicles and zeroemission ebuses There are plans to buy 273 bigsized and 237 midsized airconditioned singledecker ebuses as well as scrapping 520 selfowned buses that will complete their codallife soon the release said as per the PTIIn line with its commitment to provide uninterrupted public transport services BEST has already issued an order for procurement of 2100 singledecker electric buses of which 205 have been received it saidThis shift is expected to reduce carbon emissions and improve the citys air quality the release statedBEST also reiterated the plan to procure 1200 doubledecker electric buses of which 50 are already part of the fleet the release stated on FridayThe release however did not disclose by when these doubledecker buses will be inducted in the fleetSources said the public transport body has already cancelled the work order issued to a bus manufacturer for supplying 700 double decker buses while the company whose double decker buses are plying on wet lease model has not supplied a single vehicle since the last several months the news agency reportedBEST has scrapped all fossil fuelrun doubledecker buses in its fleet long back as their codal life was overBEST operates services in Mumbai Thane Navi Mumbai and MiraBhayandar with a fleet of more than 3000 buses and has a daily ridership of 32 lakhwith PTI inputs