Ola Electric issues recall for 1,441 units of electric two-wheelers

Bengaluru-based electric vehicle maker Ola Electric has issued a recall for 1,441 units of its electric two-wheelers in the wake of incidents of vehicles catching fire. The company is still investigating the fire incident that took place on March 26, in Pune, and preliminary assessment found that it was an isolated one. However, as a pre-emptive measure, the company will conduct a detailed diagnostic and health check of the scooters in that specific batch.

Thus, it has issued a voluntary recall of 1,441 electric scooters. These scooters will be inspected by Ola Electric's service engineers and will go through a thorough diagnostics across all battery systems, thermal systems as well as the safety systems, the company said in a statement.

The company says that its battery systems already comply with and are tested for AIS 156, the latest proposed standard for India, in addition to being compliant with the European standard ECE 136.

In recent days, there have been widespread incidents of electric two-wheelers catching fire in various parts of the country, forcing EV manufacturers to recall their vehicles. The fire incidents have also prompted the government to form a panel to examine the situation while a warning has been issued to companies about facing penalties if they are found to be negligent or erring.

Ola Electric CEO Bhavish Aggarwal responded to this by welcoming the government's move. Speaking at a factory visit for members of the media on Saturday, he backed the quality of electric scooters manufactured by his company while admitting that there may be the rare issue. “I am not saying there are no issues at all but our rate of fix is one of the best because most (of these issues) is software based," he said (Read full report here).

Recently, Okinawa Autotech also recalled over 3,000 units of its electric scooters while PureEV recalled around 2,000 units.

(with inputs from PTI)