Audi, Mercedes-Benz upbeat about Indian electric car market growth

Luxury car brands like Audi and Mercedes-Benz are upbeat about the electric car market in India. With more states introducing their respective EV policies and focusing on electrification, the German luxury car brands are hopeful that consumers in the country will be encouraged to buy electric cars. They are also hopeful that these EV policies will encourage the car manufacturers to bring in their respective electric cars, reports PTI.

The FAME-II scheme of the Indian government doesn't offer direct benefits to personal cars. But even a 5% GST rate on electric cars too will be helpful, believe the German luxury car brands. Mercedes-Benz already launched its electric car EQC in India in October 2020. Audi too introduced its e-Tron SUVs in the country last week. Both the brand hope the EV policies being introduced by various state governments will help them to witness surging demands.

Audi India has set a target of 15% of its total sales in the country to come from EVs by 2025. It plans to bring some of the EV models here out of the 20 electric cars that it aims to launch globally by 2025. Mercedes on the other hand is claimed to have witnessed a positive customer response to the EQC. The company plans to bring the next batch of EQCs to India by September this year.

As Audi India head Balbir Singh Dhillon has said, despite the overall policy being focused primarily on the two-wheelers and three-wheelers, many of the state governments are also coming forward to give incentives to electric cars.

"When the states have already declared there won't be a registration cost on the cars. You already know the GST on electric cars is 5 per cent. So these are already certain incentives the government has put in place, which will also encourage luxury players to also sell cars in the electric segment and these are definitely positive steps," Dhillon told the news agency.

Expressing similar views, Mercedes-Benz India vice-president, sales and marketing, Santosh Iyer said that the German automaker will play a pivotal role in introducing the latest technologies and products from its global portfolio for the Indian customers.

States like Gujarat and Maharashtra have announced their respective EV policies recently. Gujarat is offering a demand subsidy of ₹10,000/kwh for electric two-wheelers, electric three-wheelers and electric four-wheelers over and above the subsidies available from the central government. The maximum ex-factory prices have been capped at ₹1.5 lakh, ₹5 lakh and ₹15 lakh, respectively for the three-vehicle categories.

Maharashtra government on the other hand is offering demand incentives of ₹5,000/khw on 10,000 electric cars with the maximum incentive per vehicle being capped at ₹1.5 lakh. This comes alongside road tax and registration charges exemption.

Before Gujarat and Maharashtra, Delhi had announced a purchase incentive of ₹10,000/ kWh of battery capacity per electric four-wheeler with a maximum incentive of ₹1.5 lakh per vehicle for the first 1,000 electric cars to be registered in the national capital. Delhi government also offered a waiver of road tax and registration fees on all-electric vehicles under its EV policy.