Lucknow: Public transport infrastructure in key UP cities, considered as a weak link in a developing ecosystem, is set for a major overhaul.Determined to bring a turnaround within the 17 cities governed by municipal corporations (Firozabad and Saharanpur too would be brought under the fold within a year), the state has set the ball rolling to augment the fleet of existing 743 air-conditioned electric buses to 2,468 buses.While commuting in a city bus, not many are aware that 65% of the travel expenses are covered by the state govt while the passenger pays only 35% of the actual cost as fare.According to the recommendations of the ministry of housing and urban affairs, at least 40-60 buses should be deputed for every one lakh people. However, only three buses are available for one lakh population in urban areas of Uttar Pradesh.With the expansion of fleet, the proportion of buses to every 1 lakh urban population will go up from the existing 3 to 10.The wide gap between the income and expenditure while operating the existing fleet of 743 air-conditioned electric buses had been stopping the state from adding more buses.The city bus services are active in 15 municipal corporation cities – Lucknow, Kanpur, Agra, Mathura, Ghaziabad, Meerut, Jhansi, Moradabad, Bareilly, Jhansi, Gorakhpur, Shahjahanpur, Ayodhya, Varanasi and Aligarh.In May 2026, about 25.26 lakh commuters took buses in 15 cities and ended up paying Rs 6.15 crore as ticket fare. However, the overall expenditure to operate the buses was in the range of Rs 17.12 crore.The viability gap funding to the tune of Rs 16 crore to Rs 18 crore is provided periodically by the state govt to the directorate of urban transport, the unified metropolitan transport authority set up in 2009 to operate the city buses independently.“Public transport is a welfare activity for the state. All the metropolitan cities in India such as Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, among others, are operating the city bus transport service at losses. In our state, the per-km expense on an individual who is commuting in a bus is Rs 70 while income is in the range of Rs 24-25 for a km from a passenger. Without bringing down operational expenses, sustaining the transport services in the long run becomes a huge challenge,” a senior officer said.Director of the urban transport services in UP, Mahendra Bahadur Singh, said: “Within a few weeks we are going to float the tender document for procuring 1,725 electric buses. This time, we are going to work on gross cost contract, a public-private-partnership model under which the shortlisted entity would handle the end-to-end operations of the buses and associated infrastructure by quoting a fixed cost for operating the buses for a kilometre. The govt would cover the viability gap according to the terms and conditions.” The additional number of buses would be rolled out across the 17 cities within a year, the officer added.Though the urban transport directorate floated the requirement for the additional buses for the first time in May 2023, it did not find any takers interested in procuring and operating the buses. However, the forthcoming tender document would be floated with revised terms and conditions that were deemed necessary to improve the financial viability of the deal.Holding a cabinet meeting, the state govt on June 3 agreed to provide capital subsidy of Rs 35 lakh (for a 9-metre-long bus) and Rs 40 lakh (for a 12-metre-long bus) to the private player who comes forward on the negotiation table in the next round. The estimated cost of the two types of buses is estimated to be Rs 1.2 crore and Rs 1.5 crore, respectively.Analysis of the daily operations of the buses revealed that daily income of the city bus operators in Mathura, Ghaziabad and Prayagraj was on the higher side compared to the remaining 13 cities owing to the higher number of tourists and floating population.Severe losses are incurred in Aligarh, Bareilly and Moradabad as average occupancy during non-peak hours remains in the range of 30% to 35%.
