Ranchi, March 13: The Ranchi Municipal Corporation (RMC) has set March 23 as the deadline for bidders, willing to supply commercial buses, to submit their technical bid.

On the same day, the civic body would open technical bids for consideration, following which the bidders can make financial bids.

“The entire administrative exercise to procure the buses for the city is expected to take two more months. The city dwellers can then enjoy the ride,” said Rahul Kumar Purwar, the chief executive officer of RMC.

The civic body officials today held a meeting with the prospective bidders willing to supply commercial buses to the RMC. Purwar said the bidders wanted some clarifications in the application for technical bid, which was done today.

Representatives of four automobile companies — Tata Motors, Swaraj Mazda, Ashok Leyland and Bajaj Commercial Vehicles — took part in the meeting.

Each of these companies is likely to bid for supplying buses to the RMC.

“As we had some doubts in the technical bid forms, we asked the officials to clarify these doubts to avoid mistakes in our applications,” said Sharad Kumar Poddar, a Bajaj commercial vehicle representative, who took part in the meeting.

Under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban renewal Mission (JNNURM), the Centre has approved 100 buses for RMC, 100 for the Dhanbad local body and another 50 for Jamshedpur. The RMC, however, has been made the nodal agency to procure the buses from the suppliers for all these cities.

After getting the financial bids from the bidders, the RMC would make a proposal for purchasing the 250 buses and submit the same to the urban development department of the state government.

The RMC would form a public-private partnership committee to run the buses after procuring them from the suppliers.

Meanwhile, the RMC has already begun a drive aimed at the facelift of various bus stops in different parts of the city. Proper sitting arrangements have been made for passengers in the sheds that have been constructed.