Finally, Chandigarh rolls out e-vehicle policy

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 20

The UT Administration has finally rolled out its Electric Vehicle (EV) Policy. Apart from providing incentives to EV buyers, the UT will stop the registration of two-wheelers and three-wheelers running on internal combustion engine (ICE) from 2024-25.

The UT Administrator, Banwarilal Purohit, today approved the Electric Vehicle Policy, 2022 to make Chandigarh a “Model EV City” by achieving zero emission vehicles (ZEV) among all Indian cities by the end of the policy period of five years. The policy has come into force with immediate effect.

In a bid to gradually phase out the two-wheelers and three-wheelers running on ICE, the administration will ensure the registration of a minimum of 35 per cent electric two-wheelers (e-2W) and electric three-wheelers (e-3W) in 2022-23, 70 per cent in 2023-24 and further 100 per cent from 2024-25.

The UT Adviser, Dharam Pal, said the registration of two-wheelers and three-wheelers running on ICE would be stopped when the registration of these vehicles reached 65 per cent (2022-23), and it would be calculated on the basis of the total number of vehicles registered during the previous year. In 2023-24, the registration of vehicles running on fossil fuel will be stopped after the number of registered vehicles reaches 30 percent.

To accelerate the promotion of EVs in the UT so that these contribute to 80 per cent of new vehicle registrations by the end of the policy period, the administration has set a target of 100 per cent registration of new e-two-wheelers, e-three-wheelers, e-four-wheelers (goods), e-cars (commercial) and e-buses by the end of five years, with 50 per cent registration of e-cars for personal use. Apart from a complete waiver on registration fee and road tax, the UT has offered incentives in the range from Rs 3,000 to Rs 2 lakh for a limited number of vehicles of various categories during the policy period to encourage buyers to purchase EVs.

The Adviser said various incentive provisions had been made in the policy to encourage people to switch to e-vehicles to have lesser carbon footprint and make Chandigarh carbon neutral at the earliest.

Besides, a special early bird incentive will also be given to the vehicles purchased and registered in the first year of the policy period. The policy will also help in creating charging infrastructure in every sector. In the first two years of the policy period, 100 public charging stations will be installed in the city. Nine fast-charging stations have already been set up at different locations in the city, while 44 more will be installed in the next few months.

Debendra Dalai, Secretary, Science and Technology, said incentives would be provided directly to the owners of the vehicles purchased and registered in Chandigarh.

The incentive cases would be processed offline for the time being, later only online mode applications will be submitted on the web portal. The detailed standard operating process for incentive cases would be notified shortly.

Scrapping Incentive Eligibility Criteria

Dalai said registered owners of electric vehicles would also be eligible for a scrapping incentive. This will be applicable only if the scrapped vehicle is of the same vehicle category as the electric vehicle and is registered in Chandigarh.

Charging tariff

The public have to pay Rs 8 per unit for slow or medium charging, Rs 10 per unit for fast charging and Rs 11 per unit for battery swapping, including all taxes.

Fast-charging stations

• Parking area beside GMSH-16
• Community Hall, Sector 9
• Public parking area, Sector 24-A
• Government College, Sector 50
• Palm Garden, Sector 42
• Botanical Garden, Sarangpur
• Japanese Garden (Part 1), Sector 31
• Japanese Garden (Part 2), Sector 31
• Lake Parking, Sector 42

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