PMRDA vs PMC, or PCMC: why the authority behind your Pune flat matters

Two towers can stand a short drive apart in the same Pune pincode, 411057, and carry permissions from two different bodies: one in Wakad, sanctioned by the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, and one in Hinjewadi, sanctioned by the Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority. The brochures may use the same locality name for both. PMRDA vs PMC is how the question is usually put, but in Pune district the honest answer has at least three bodies in it, and the one that matters is the body named on the project's own filing.

Rohit's two towers in one pincode#

Rohit (illustrative, as our stories always are) was choosing a Pune flat from abroad, and two of the three projects on his shortlist shared the pincode 411057. One was in Wakad and one in Hinjewadi, and the brochures made them sound like neighbours in the same market. When he asked his brother-in-law in Pune to confirm each project's commencement certificate, the first question came back from the brother-in-law, not the builder: confirm it with whom? The filings answered it. The Wakad project named PCMC; the Hinjewadi one named PMRDA. Names and numbers in this story are illustrative.

The flat Rohit booked was the Wakad one. The check took his brother-in-law one visit to the right office instead of two to the wrong ones.

Three bodies, and what each one does#

PMC, the Pune Municipal Corporation, is the planning authority and the civic body for the city of Pune. It sanctions building plans and issues commencement and occupancy certificates within its limits, and it runs the services and bills the property tax there. Its limits grew in 2021, when 23 villages were merged into it, taking its area from 331 to 518 sq km, larger than Mumbai's 434 sq km, as reported at the time.

PCMC, the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, does the same for Pimpri-Chinchwad, which includes Wakad, Ravet, Punawale, Tathawade and Moshi.

PMRDA, the Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority, plans and permits development across the metropolitan region outside the areas that plan for themselves, such as Hinjewadi, Maan and Marunji. It is a planning and development authority, not a civic body: outside the corporations, the property tax bill and local services come from the municipal council in towns such as Talegaon or Chakan, or from the gram panchayat in a village.

Think of it like school boards. Two schools on the same street can follow different boards, and the board, not the street, decides the syllabus and signs the certificate. A pincode is the street. The planning authority is the board that signed the project's permissions, and the one to ask whether they are genuine.

What the filings name#

The denominator matters. Only 5,757 of Pune district's 13,790 published projects, 41.7 percent, name a sanctioning body at all, because the field is a recent habit: 8.5 percent of 2017 registrations fill it, 51.9 percent of 2022's and 91.5 percent of 2025's. So the chart is mostly a picture of what has been registered in the last four years. Among the 3,090 projects registered from 2024 to 3 October 2026, 2,740 name a body, and the split is PMC 42.4 percent, PCMC 26.5 percent, PMRDA 17.6 percent and municipal councils 8.0 percent.

The 112 filings that say only "PMC" are counted on their own. Most sit in Pune city's own villages, but a few are filed in Pimpri-Chinchwad's limits or outside both corporations, so folding them into either would be a guess.

One pincode, two authorities#

A pincode was designed to deliver post, not to draw planning boundaries, and in Pune's growth belts it routinely straddles them. Mahalunge, Sus and Bavdhan Budruk in this table are among the villages merged into PMC in 2021, yet the projects there name PMRDA, which is the next part of the story.

The 23 merged villages#

When the state merged 23 villages into PMC in June 2021, it kept PMRDA as their planning authority. PMRDA drew up a draft development plan for its region, which the state government cancelled in April 2025, and a notification of 11 February 2026 transferred planning powers for the 23 villages to PMC, as reported at the time. In April 2026 the urban development department told the authorities to decide building permission proposals in merged villages within 60 days.

The register follows the permissions, not the boundary. Of the 1,038 projects filed in these villages, 420 name a body, and 388 of those name PMRDA. Even registrations after February 2026 mostly name PMRDA, because a project registers only after its commencement certificate is issued, and for these that was most likely before the handover. For a buyer that means the office that sanctioned the plans and the office that will issue later approvals, such as a revised plan or the occupancy certificate, may not be the same.

If you are weighing a project in one of these villages, its free ReraGenie page shows the sanctioning authority where the filing names one, beside the permission chain, so you can see whose signature you are relying on before you pay a booking amount. Start from the projects page.

Where buyers get it wrong#

Reading the authority off the pincode or the brochure. A brochure's locality is a marketing choice. The filing names the body, and the commencement certificate carries the issuing office.

Checking a permission with the wrong office. A forged or mistaken permission is caught only by the office that would have issued it, the lesson of checking a permission at its source. In Pune district that office can be either corporation, PMRDA, a municipal council or a nagar panchayat.

Assuming a merged village means PMC signed the plans. In the merged villages nearly every project naming a body names PMRDA. Read whose stamp is on the certificate, and see how to read a sanctioned plan for what else the plan's approval states.

Assuming the planning authority bills the tax. PMRDA permits; the corporation, the council or the gram panchayat bills property tax and runs local services. Which one it is affects your running costs for as long as you own the flat.

Assuming the rules are identical. The Unified Development Control and Promotion Regulations apply across most of Maharashtra, with city-specific provisions where the state has made them; which planning authority governs your plot and Pune's city-specific provisions set out where they differ.

What the report shows for one project#

The Rs 499 buyer report answers land and title as five questions for one project, including who owns the land as filed and what right the promoter has to build and sell, and ends with what to verify before you book, built from the conditions the filing raises. It also lists the projects within 2 km and how each has ended, which in a pincode split between two authorities shows the neighbours on both sides of the line. For the district picture, the Pune housing market in the filings reads the whole register.

Methodology and sources#

• ReraGenie analysis of 13,790 published MahaRERA registrations in Pune district, as updated on 3 October 2026. The sanctioning body is read from the filing's own field; spellings of the same body (including "Poona Municipal Corporation" and misspellings of each name) are counted together, and filings that say only "PMC" are kept apart.
• Merged villages are matched by filed village name: 20 of the 23 notified villages appear in the filings; Wadachiwadi, Jambhulwadi and Kolewadi do not appear under those names. Bavdhan Khurd and Manjari Khurd, which were not among the 23, are excluded.
• PMC's area after the 2021 merger: 331 to 518 sq km against Mumbai's 434 sq km, Deccan Herald, 2021.
• PMRDA's draft development plan cancelled by the state government in April 2025; planning powers for the 23 villages transferred to PMC by a notification of 11 February 2026; the urban development department's 60-day direction of 7 April 2026: as reported by Pune Pulse, Punekar News and The Bridge Chronicle in 2025 and 2026.

This article is educational and not legal advice. Confirm a project's permissions with the authority that issued them.