The government is banking hard on the electric vehicle future of India and in a bid to nudge the makers in the same direction, it had introduced the FAME plan. Now the government has updated the aforementioned scheme and brought forth the FAME-II plan. The scheme brings subsidies to makers and buyers of electric vehicles depending on the type and battery of the vehicle. Now in a move from the auto industry, electric scooter company Okinawa is offering the subsides under the FAME-II scheme to customers.
The new policy by the government grants the subsidy to products that meet the criteria. The policy states that the products must be at least 50% localised, be able to achieve and exceed the speed of 40 kmph, have a range of 80 km on a single charge, with additional incentives on featuring lithium-ion batteries. The new scheme by the government brings subsidies worth up to Rs. 26,000 for these electric scooters. Okinawa i-Praise’s prices are lowered by Rs. 17,000 subsidy and the Okinawa Ridge+ will see a price drop of Rs. 26,000 due to Faster Adoption and Manufacture of hybrid and Electric vehicles scheme. This subsidy is determined on the basis of the battery capacity of the vehicles.
While announcing the price drop for these scooters, the founder and managing director of Okinawa Autotech, Jeetender Sharma stated,
With eligibility under Fame-II, our customers will be able to enjoy standard subsidy depending upon the model battery kwh. For Okinawa Ridge+ & i-Praise the subsidy would be between Rs 17000 – Rs 26000 based on KWH. We are confident that this will motivate more environmentally conscious customers to become a part of the Okinawa family to enjoy not only the benefits of e-scooters but also the advanced features offered in the Okinawa range. Our vision has always been aligned with the Government of India. With the thought process to provide the consumer with the ‘Make in India’ product we started working initially on the localization of our electric two-wheeler components which helped us in getting the FAME-II approval.”
Talking about the Okinawa i-Praise, it comes with a removable battery pack that is rated for 2.9 kWh and gives the scooter a range of nearly 180 kms. The battery also comes with fast charge that can fully charge it in nearly 2-3 hours. The i-Praise comes with other features such as geo-fencing, GPS tracking and speed alert. On the other hand, Ridge+ boasts of cloud connectivity and comes with a 1.75 kWh battery pack. After the subsidies the prices of the scooters are supposed to come down drastically. Apart from the price benefits the FAME II also brings several other perks for the customers which include free parking and no toll on highways.
