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Indian EV market booms: Sales record cross one million units
In FY22-23, India's sales of
electric vehicles
surpassed one million units for the first time. The Society of Manufacturers of Electric Vehicles (SMEV) has released figures showing that in FY 2023, sales of e-buses, e-cars, e-three-wheelers, and e-two-wheelers totalled 11,52,021 units. This is an increase of 58% from the 7,26,861 units sold in FY21–22.Two-wheelers made up the largest portion of the EV market (62%), selling 7,26,976 high-speed EVs, despite adoption falling month over month and "ending with an annual shortfall of more than 25% over the minimum target set by Niti Aayog," according to a statement from SMEV. Aside from this, the total number of two-wheelers sold in FY23 includes 120,000 low-speed e-scooters, 2,85,443 low-speed
e-rickshaws
, and almost 50,000 low-speed e-cycles, bringing the total number of low- and high-speed-two-wheelers-sold-to 8,46,976 units.The number is significantly higher than the 3,28,000 units sold in FY22 and the 27,888 electric two-wheelers sold in FY17. With 4,01,841 units produced, electric three-wheelers accounted for the second-largest EV market share in FY23.
Electric four-wheelers
sold 47,217 units at 4%, but electric buses only sold 1,904 units at 0.16%. The suspension of FAME2 subsidies for businesses that do not meet localisation requirements, however, has raised concerns from the industry, which claims that it has hurt sales.According to the SMEV statement, the sudden withholding of more than the 1,200 crores in subsidies that the majority of OEMS had already passed on to customers under the pretext of a delay in localization was the reason why the momentum for the adoption of electric two-wheelers "fell after the festive season, not because of consumer demand." Due to allegations of underbilling in order to circumvent FAME regulations, "an additional 400 crore of the OEMS operating in the premium end also got stuck."
16 businesses are now waiting for this stalemate to be resolved. "While all the earlier programmes since 2015 had almost an unrecognizable effect on the adoption of EVs, the revised FAME2 had a dramatic effect on the adoption of e-two wheelers as it decreased their prices by about 35%," said Sohinder Gill, director general, SMEV. Due to the exceedingly low number of electric two-wheelers, the component supply chain had previously avoided anything related to them. Late in 2021, suppliers started lining up with OEMS to indicate their interest in creating EV components. Most of these vendors needed 12 to 18 months on average to complete localization.