The Centre held its first consultation meeting with members of the automotive industry, including Tesla representatives, on Thursday in advance of Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s visit to India. The purpose of the meeting was to develop guidelines for operationalizing the new electric vehicle (EV) policy that was released last month. Industry and official sources were informed of this development.
Attendees at the initial of these types of discussions included representatives from Tesla as well as officials from the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Heavy Industries (MHI). Automobile manufacturers including Tata Motors, Maruti Suzuki, Mahindra & Mahindra, Volkswagen, Mercedes, and Toyota were also present.
Although the EV policy was introduced last month, the draft rules have not yet been made public. The purpose of the automobile industry consultation was to draft the policy’s guidelines. An industry official present at the conference stated that this was the first of its kind and that more are planned to create the standards.
The country’s expenditures in electric vehicle (EV) manufacture, which is still in its infancy but is predicted to develop into a significant market segment in the automotive industry in the years to come, should become clearer with the release of the rules.
Following India’s easing of duties for a restricted number of EV imports for manufacturers establishing facilities there with a minimum investment of completely built-up (CBU) cars at a 15% import charge, Tesla has decided to participate. Tesla wrote to the relevant central ministries in 2021 to request a reduction in import charges on fully completed cars. The company requested that duties be lowered to between 40 and 15 percent, depending on the car’s pricing. That requirement is essentially met by the new policy.
Nonetheless, there is a cap of 8,000 e-4w each year that can be imported at the lower tariff rate. The policy stated that unused annual import quotas could be carried over.
Presently, India holds the third position in the global automotive market and is seeing rapid growth. The automobile industry currently has a market value of Rs 12.5 lakh crore, and by 2030, it is predicted to reach Rs 24.9 lakh crore. Over 7.1% of the GDP of the nation is generated by the automotive industry.
