New Delhi, Mar 6 (KNN) The automotive industry in India should aim for complete electrification of two-wheeler and three-wheeler segments over the next five years, said G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant on Monday.

Addressing the ‘National Dialogue on Emerging Trends in E-Mobility’ organised by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), Kant said, “This will not only help reduce air pollution but also ensure that we become a global manufacturing champion for electric two-wheelers and three-wheelers.”

Kant pointed out that there is a need for mechanisms such as first-loss guarantees, credit enhancement and blended finance, to enable private-capital to flow at scale.

“We must target to install five million fast chargers, and push for battery swapping and PLIs for localised manufacturing," he said.

During the event, Kant also released CEEW Centre for Energy Finance’s (CEEW-CEF) independent report ‘Greening India’s Automotive Sector’.

The report pointed out that more electric vehicles (EVs) were sold in the country in the first six months of FY23 than in the previous full financial year.

“EVs constituted 6 per cent of all new auto sales in September 2022, up from only 1 per cent in January 2021,” it added.

CEEW-CEF also launched its ‘Electric Mobility Dashboard’, a free, online tool that captures and dynamically updates, on a fortnightly basis, EV volumes at a national, state and RTO level," it said.

Till now, twenty-one Indian states have notified their own EV policies, with 15 of these providing incentives in the form of subsidies to buyers. Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are the most recent states to announce EV policies.  (KNN Bureau)