An official who wishes to be unnamed said that it is still not clear whether Tesla has lost interest in investing in India or not.
Tesla’s board of directors are yet to clarify whether they will invest in India under the new EV policy or not. After a lot of hullabaloo in the media, there is hardly any progress by Elon Musk and his team. Under the new EV policy, the government offers lower tariffs with some conditions that have sparked Tesla to invest in India. But, no updates for several weeks indicates that the company is yet to consider its investment.
A couple of months back, it was even reported that Musk requested a meeting with Prime Minister Modi to set-up Tesla’s new factory in India with a speculated investment of $2-3 billion. Nonetheless, his visit to India was called off without any crystal clear reasons. Although ‘heavy obligations’ at the company have been cited by some directors, further response and rescheduling is still awaiting from Tesla.
The new EV policy comprises numerous conditional incentives to invite foreign EV companies to set-up their bases in India. The policy seems to be fruitful, but the companies will have to invest at least Rs 41.5 billion with production commencement within three years. The policy also offers import duty rebates to manufacturers, but again with specified conditions.
An official who wishes to be unnamed said that it is still not clear whether Tesla has lost interest in investing in India or not. In Tesla, the CEO takes most of the decisions and therefore, we will have to wait for his tweet.
Under the new EV policy, manufacturers meeting all the criterias will be permitted to 8,000 EVs every year with a import duty exemption of 15 percent on those vehicles, which costs $35,000 and beyond. Based on the value of the cars, the government imposes a tax of 70-100 percent. The draft guideline on the EV policy is speculated to be unleashed soon by the officials.
