Cost of electric vehicles will be on a par with petrol variants in 2 years: Nitin Gadkari

The government is taking several steps and making policies so that the sales of electric vehicles increase in the near future. Electric vehicles will be subsidized under the FAME program. However, it is still much more expensive than traditional vehicles. Transport and Roads Minister, Nitin Gadkari promised that prices for electric cars will be similar to those for petrol and diesel cars within the coming next two years.

Minister Nitin Gadkari said during a webinar hosted by the Danish Foundation for Sustainable Development that the cost of driving an electric car is much lower than the cost of driving a petrol car. As per him, India is looking forward to it. It also keeps citizens' expenses low. He said petrol, diesel, and electric cars will be available at the same price in the coming next two years.

5% GST on Electric Vehicle

According to Nitin Gadkari, the goods and services tax for electric vehicles is only 5% and the goods and services tax for petrol cars is 48%. The high cost of the electric vehicle is due to the lithium used in EV batteries of electric vehicles. However, a further increase in lithium production will lead to lower prices. Eventually, with the increase in Lithium production, the cost of electric vehicles will fall. He further added that in addition, the government has developed a policy that says that the petrol stations must have electric vehicle charging ports. Two years later, many charging stations for Electric cars and Electric bikes emerged across India. As per him, The development of electric vehicles in this country is gaining momentum. Petrol cars cost Rs 10 per km, diesel cars Rs 7/km, and electric cars Rs 1/km.

Every step towards green vehicles is important as India has ambitious targets to have 30% private electric vehicles, 70% commercial electric vehicles, 40% electric buses, and 80% electric motorcycles and e-scooters by 2030. Taking into account the subsidy factor, the costs of motorcycles and bicycles are approximately equal to those of petrol and traditional vehicles nowadays.

Charging Station infrastructure increasing gradually

Government is on its way to installing thousands of charging stations and points in the country over the next two years. Installation of 350 charging points on the market square has already been started. Fuel pumps can be equipped with electric vehicle equipment as per the new policy. The Road and Transport Minister also said that he is planning a potential pilot project to install an electric highway system on the Delhi-Mumbai highway that can harness the region's abundant solar energy for electrification. Nitin Gadkari expects to meet 50% of its energy demand from renewables by 2030 and cut its carbon emissions by 1 million tons between 2020 and 2030. He said the country expects to reduce its energy demand by approximately 45% carbon to meet the COP26 commitment and to reach zero emissions by 2070. As per the plan of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), they will install at least 700 EV charging stations across its major highways in the country by 2023. These will be spread across a range of 40-60 kms. The currently installed renewable energy capacity in India is 145 GW, the fourth largest in the world. Gadkari agreed that charging through solar panels installed in houses, shopping malls, parking lots, and offices will make owning electric vehicles more cheap and affordable.

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