Ahead of the festive season, the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) has good news to offer to those who travel frequently between Nagpur and Pune. MSRTC will soon introduce non-AC (air conditioned) sleeper buses on this route. The move will largely benefit students and professionals who are mostly disappointed after getting wait-listed tickets in trains and also have to shell out big ticket price charged by privates bus operators, especially in festive season. Speaking on the development, Gautam Shende, Depot Manager, Ganeshpeth Bus Stand, stated that they were awaiting the arrival of buses and the services would be pushed immediately once received.

 

The bus will have a total capacity of 45 passengers of which 15 seats will be sleeper and 30 will be seating. There will be two services that will start from Nagpur to Pune at 12 noon and 5 pm. Similarly, two buses will be deployed from Pune to Nagpur route that will leave on the same timings for their journey towards Nagpur. The distance between the two cities will be covered in 14 hours. The bus will be routed through Amravati and will not take the Samruddhi Mahamarg, Shende stated. MSRTC had earlier started the Nagpur-Shirdi sleeper bus service that received a lukewarm response from travellers. The bus had only two stops -- one at Ganeshpeth Bus Stand, and the other at Nagpur Airport. During its run, only 3 to 4 passengers used to travel in its journey from Nagpur to Shirdi and back, explained Shende. The bus service was running into losses and eventually MSRTC had to terminate the services. MSRTC presently runs Shivshahi buses on the Nagpur-Pune route, but there were no sleeper services. The sleeper bus service will be an alternative to travellers on the route that has a huge demand. The price for one way ticket will be Rs 1,400, stated an official.