Government Will Offer Incentives Only to Startups For Production of Electric Cars

Under the new scheme by the Indian Government to promote local production of electric cars , companies which make fresh investment in a new manufacturing facility will only get the incentive. Seniors Government officials told this to Economic Times. Foreign firms can also apply for benefits under the Scheme for Manufacturing of Electric (SMEC) cars which allow automakers to initially import high-end electric cars at a concessional duty. But there will no retrospective approval for previous investments.

The Government official further said that the investments required to be made would have to be in a greenfield facility from the date of receiving nod under the SMEC and within the next three years. Restricting the scheme to new units would help in accurately assessing localization of content. Another Government official said, “If the same facility were to be utilized for manufacturing internal combustion engine vehicles and electric cars, it would become impossible to accurately calculate the localization content in EV.