At a function organised in the parliament complex, prime minister Narendra Modi gifted two electric buses to the members of parliament. The electric buses were handed over to the Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan in the presence of road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari. The buses have been developed by KPIT, Pune, in consultations with the Central Institute of Road Transport. Known to have been retrofitted with an electric propulsion system, the entire buses were built locally. They are powered by Lithium-Ion batteries, the kind the Indian Space Research Organisation, IIT Kharagpur and IIT Madras are known to be in the process of developing. Speaking on the occasion, Gadkari said that the Lithium Ion batteries made locally would transform existing diesel buses into electric propelled ones. He hinted at a scalable program that could turn out 1.5 lakh electric buses under a retrofitment exercise, following the success of the two retrofitted electric buses that will serve the members of the parliament. The initial sum of investment is expected to be in the region of Rs. 10 crore.