File photo of Elon Musk.
HIGHLIGHTS
File photo of Elon Musk.
He may have recently played down chances of Tesla coming to India in 2017 but Elon Musk – widely regarded as one of the pioneers in development of electric cars – appears to be keeping a close watch on developments here. On Thursday, the Tesla CEO tweeted a report which highlighted India’s vision of saying farewell to cars powered by fossil fuels by 2030.
On April 30, power minister Piyush Goyal had said the country is looking at an all-electric fleet by 2030+ . “We are going to introduce electric vehicles in a very big way. The idea is that by 2030, not a single petrol or diesel car should be sold in the country,” Goyal had said while addressing the CII Annual Session 2017. Musk took note of the intent and recognised that the country is already the largest market for solar power.
India indeed is at the cusp of being a viable market for selling products which make use of clean energy. The potential demand is only second to the sheer urgency in reasons for a switch, considering India’s toxic air has become globally infamous. Add to that that the country is the third-largest importer of oil which adds a burden of $150 billion yearly. However, there is still some way before, at least, electric cars become more prevalent.
Musk’s words were lapped up by Anand Mahindra, the chairman of Mahindra & Mahindra, who invited the US businessman to India for selling his green cars.
Musk in a Twitter reply in May had said he was told 30 per cent of parts must be locally sourced in India and that the “supply does not exist to support that.”
This fueled speculation that the speculative launch of Tesla cars in India won’t happen in India. While there is still no word on when and if Tesla would come here, the Indian government had replied to Musk’s observation by using its #MakeinIndia handle on the micro-blogging platform.
[“Source-ndtv”]