The Union Minister of Road and Highway Transport and the Minister of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Nitin Gadkari, told The Indian Express Idea Exchange program on Monday that the US clean energy and electric vehicle company Tesla “will begin operations. “in India in early 2021.
During the conversation with the editors of Indian Express, the minister underlined the push for electric cars in the country and said that many Indian companies were also working on electric vehicles that could be more affordable, but technically as advanced as the Tesla. He said Tesla will start operations first with sales and then perhaps analyze assembly and manufacturing based on the response to cars. “India will become a number one car manufacturing center in five years,” Gadkari added.
In October, Tesla CEO Elon Musk suggested that the the company will arrive in India in 2021 while replying to a tweet from India. “Next year for sure,” Musk responded when asked by a nickname called the Tesla Club India about the company’s progress in India.
Recent reports suggest that the first model to arrive in India will be the More affordable Tesla Model 3, reservation for which could begin in a few weeks. However, the Economic Times report said that sales will occur only in the second half of the year. The fully built units will be imported and will likely be priced at Rs 55 lakh and up. Most likely, Tesla will handle sales directly as it does in other parts of the world.
In 2016, Tesla raised a $ 1000 deposit from interested buyers in India. However, those consumers are still waiting for their cars and some of them told indianexpress.com that they were disappointed in the company.
In 2017, a year after the company started taking bookings, Musk had said his cars could arrive in India in the summer, but later blamed FDI rules for the delay. “Maybe I am misinformed, but I was told that 30% of the parts must be locally sourced and the supply does not yet exist in India to support that,” he tweeted.
.
