Incentive in Budgets for E-Vehicle Makers

[cooldhaya]

NEW DELHI: Though sale of environment-friendly electric vehicles is slowly picking up in India, its manufacturers feel that much more needs to be done in terms of providing incentives and developing infrastructure to promote e-vehicles and help conserve environment. The Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV) has urged Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to announce some path-breaking initiatives in his forthcoming budget to promote use of electric two-wheelers and four-wheelers as eco-friendly mode of transport.

Boosting sales

Underlining the priorities of the sector, SMEV President Naveen Munjal, who is also the Managing Director of Hero Electric, told The Hindu that “Apart from cutting duties on import of components used in manufacturing e-vehicles, the government should provide subsidies and rationalise tax structure to boost sale of electric vehicles. To boost domestic industry, import duties on completely-built units (CBUs) of e-vehicles should be increased.”

Demanding a comprehensive policy on ‘Electric Vehicle Mobility' from the government, Mr. Munjal said there should be a nation-wide subsidy of at least 25 per cent on purchases of e-vehicles as being done by the Delhi government.

Other states should implement this to promote eco-friendly vehicles, he said. At present, over one-lakh electric two-wheelers are sold in India and the industry is growing at 30 per cent annually, while the electric car market is still at its nascent stage. Mr. Munjal said SMEV had been demanding removal of inverted import duty structure on electric vehicles and of excise duty of over 8 per cent on critical items such as battery, motor, controller, charger to catalyse their indigenisation, and doing away with value-added tax.

“These fiscal incentives are a must to promote manufacturing of e-vehicles. Promotion of e-vehicles would also help government save on huge amount of foreign exchange paid to fund imports of crude oil for automobiles,” he said.

Mr. Munjal said India had all the potential to emerge as the leading manufacturer and exporter of e-vehicles, and the government should become active facilitator for the same.


Source:Hindu

[350Z]

I read this news a day before, Delhi Government is already offering some incentives for Maini Reva and it’ll be nice if whole country adopts this path. However, The majority of public would still not easily accept cars such as Reva which can not suffice the needs of a typical family which also needs to make weekend trips on highways, Moreover in foreign countries there are electrical sockets on every road side where you can charge your EV but currently it’ll be much sensible to offer incentives for Hybrids vehicles in India.

Drive Safe,
350Z

[Aditya]

I think Karnataka also subsidizes the Reva.

[amaan1994]

This is a good move by the Indian government. It was much needed. After all, on one hand, the government itself promotes saving the environment, and then levies heavy taxes on cars which save the environment! Hopefully now, hybrids and eco-friendly EVs will finally be affordable for the common man.

[Umang]

it will be great if there is some concession for hybrids but don't think our govt will do it any soon for hybrid since they all are imported and import = heavy tax = more from our pockets!! but EV like reva is manufactured in India.