Electric Vehicles In India: Tata Motors on Wednesday said it remains confident about the long-term prospects of the electric vehicle segment and termed the fall in sales numbers a “short-term” issue. Shailesh Chandra, Managing Director of Tata Motors Passenger Vehicle and Tata Passenger Electric, said “EV industry is a part of the larger PV trend that we are seeing of overall demand stress, which I would say is of a temporary nature.” The good thing is that inquiries and bookings are holding well, he said.

There was a very high base effect of the first quarter also, he said, and added that “therefore there’s a larger industry trend also impacting (the sales) but primarily EV has come down because of the fleet segment.” 

“So, I don’t see an issue from a mid-to-long term as far as EVs are concerned,” Chandra said. The passenger electric vehicle sales for Tata Motors and other OEMs have been on a declining trend for the last four months.

According to automobile dealers’ body FADA, passenger electric vehicle sales in July dipped 2.92 per cent year-on-year to 7,541 units from 7,768 units in the same month last year, with market leader Tata Motors seeing a 12 per cent decline at 4,775 units as against 5,471 passenger electric cars retailed in July 2023.

He said that the personal segment is absolutely stable in demand but the fleet segment came down completely in the first quarter because of the pre-buying in the March quarter due to the discontinuation of the FAME-11 scheme, which is 20 per cent of our total sales.

“That was the whole reason and there is a high-base effect of last year,” he added. Chandra said that the barriers which existed two years back when the EVs were growing at 100-200 per cent, were much higher as compared to now from a charging, price or range anxiety perspective.

Today there are 15,000-16,000 EV charges on the highways as compared to a few hundred that were there earlier, Chandra said. “So why there should be any concern,” he said.

“So I believe that it’s a short-term issue and we should not bother too much about (the declining sales numbers). The long-term trend has to be EV and therefore one should be very confident and focused on that,” he said while referring to a 12 per cent year-on-year decline in EV sales in July 2024.

Chandra said that the regulations are also being framed in a manner that promotes the EV industry. He said that hopefully the FAME-III incentives should also be able to accommodate and continue what was in the earlier version of the scheme in terms of the category of vehicles.

Tata Motors’ passenger electric portfolio now comprises Tiago EV, Tigor RV, Punch EV, Nexon, and Curvv EV. Moreover, EV sales account for 12 per cent of the company’s total sales. Chandra said that the company is looking to achieve one-lakh electric vehicle sales this financial year.