India Home To 21.7 Lakh Registered EVs, 10,967 Public Charging Stations: MoS

India is home to 21.7 Lakh registered electric vehicles (EV), Minister of State (MoS) for Heavy Industries Krishan Pal Gurjar informed the Parliament on Tuesday (March 14). 

As per data collated till March 6, Uttar Pradesh led the charts with more than 4.65 Lakh EV registrations, followed by Maharashtra at 2.26 Lakh registrations. While Delhi took the third spot with 2.03 Lakh registration, Bengaluru stood fourth with 1.83 Lakh EV registrations. 

The data also revealed that Delhi had the highest number of public charging stations (PCS) in the country at 1,845. While Karnataka has 704 such stations, Maharashtra has 660 EV charging stations. In total, India has 6,586 public charging stations across the length and breadth of the country. 

In a separate reply quoting Bureau of Energy Efficiency data, the minister noted that a total of 10,967 such stations are currently operational in the country.

The minister added that the country, on average, has 199 EVs for every public charging station.

Speaking on the controversy-ridden second iteration of the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid &) Electric Vehicles in India (FAME-II) scheme, Gurjar said that 8.82 Lakh EVs have so far been supported under the initiative. 

Maharashtra led the charts as it approved more than 1.55 Lakh EVs for subsidies, followed by Karnataka at 1.29 Lakh subsidised EVs.

The ministry also sanctioned 6,315 electric buses for 65 state and local body entities for both intercity and intracity operations. Additionally, as many as 1,576 charging stations along 16 highways and nine expressways have also received the government’s approval under the FAME-II scheme.

Giving a breakdown of the data, the minister noted that the FAME-II scheme has seen complete utilisation of its budgetary allocation from FY20 to FY22. However, in FY23, the ministry only utilised INR 1,217 Cr till February against an allocation of INR 2,903 Cr. 

With just a month to go before the financial year ends, the government still has more than 50% of the corpus that is yet to be utilised. 

With an outlay of INR 895 Cr, the FAME-I scheme supported nearly 2.8 Lakh EVs with subsidies and rolled out 425 electric buses under the initiative. As many as 520 charging stations were sanctioned, while projects worth INR 158 Cr were approved for the development of technology, including establishing a centre of excellence to spur research.

Underlining the steps taken to boost the adoption of EVs in the country, the centre reiterated that it has approved the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for manufacturing advanced chemistry cells (ACC) as well as for auto and auto components to promote local manufacturing.

The ministry also noted that it has reduced GST on EVs and EV chargers, as well as exempted EVs from permit requirements.

This comes a week after reports emerged that the government was considering quashing the FAME-II scheme altogether after FY24, amid allegations of misappropriation of subsidies. While the Centre has launched a full-blown investigation into the matter, big names such as Hero Electric, Okinawa Autotech and Ampere Vehicles have reportedly come under the government scanner in the matter. 

These original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) allegedly claimed subsidies without following the minimum localisation requirements. As a result, the Centre halted the subsidies, which has pushed the OEMs to raise prices. This, in turn, has impacted the growth momentum of two-wheeler EV registrations in the country, which grew a mere 1.6% month-on-month (MoM) to 65,623 units in February.