Tesla, the electric carmaker led by Elon Musk, has remained silent on its plans for India under the new Electric Vehicle (EV) policy, according to an official who spoke to the news agency PTI on Friday. This silence comes despite the planned visit of Musk to India on April 21-22, which was later postponed due to commitments at Tesla. During his planned visit, Musk was also slated to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss Tesla’s potential entry into the Indian market.
“They (Tesla) are just silent. The (EV) policy was always meant for everybody,” the official told PTI when asked about the carmaker’s communication of its plans to the government. The companies announce the commercial decisions, the official added. An e-mail query PTI sent to Tesla was not answered.
Earlier in April, Musk had confirmed his visit to India in a post on X (formerly Twitter) saying, “Looking forward to meeting with Prime Minister @NarendraModi in India”. Musk had met PM Modi in June last year and had said that he planned to visit India in 2024. He was confident that Tesla would enter the Indian market soon.
Musk was expected to announce plans for Tesla to establish a manufacturing unit in India, along with investments potentially amounting to billions of dollars. Additionally, he was expected to outline the strategy for selling Tesla electric cars in India as soon as possible. The billionaire has previously called for an import duty reduction in India so that Tesla cars could be sold in the country.
His planned visit to India came after the government announced a new electric vehicle policy. The policy, which aims to attract global players like Tesla by offering import duty concessions to companies setting up manufacturing units in the country with a minimum investment of $500 million, is intended to encourage such investments.
The new EV policy would allow companies setting up manufacturing facilities for EV passenger cars to import a limited number of cars at lower customs/import duty of 15 per cent on vehicles costing $35,000 and above for five years from the date of issuance of the approval letter by the government.
