Speaking at the International Conference on Electric Vehicles - Future Roadmap for India in New Delhi, Amitabh Kant, CEO of the government think tank NITI Aayog, said that the government’s target for electric vehicle use will holistically develop automobiles and allied industries, without hindering growth prospects. Currently, automobiles and their components contribute 7.2 percent to India’s total GDP, and help create over 30 million jobs and exports almost 25 percent of its total manufacturing.
“We will continue to support this movement in a very big way. We will continue to support all OEM and Indian manufacturers. We would like major disruptions to take place in India, we would like interoperable charging systems and we would like to support EVs by a vast range of initiatives like lower road taxes. The government will act as a catalyst to support this entire movement so that the automobile and auto component sector continues to play a very major and significant role in India’s GDP, job creation as well as exports,” said Kant.
“As a policy framework this cuts across several departments – Ministry of Road Transport, Power, Heavy Industries – but we in NITI Aayog will continue to coordinate and drive this movement,” he added.
When addressing the problems faced by the industry, he said, “The change is inevitable but we should do it in a manner where we do not disturb combustion vehicle manufacturing. We should do to size and scale which will enable India to become a centre for manufacturing, battery manufacturing for usage as well as for exports. It is possible to do this in India because our per Capita Usage of Cars is still very low,” Kant concluded.
