The government is cognisant of the auto industry’s demand for reducing GST on electric vehicle batteries as well as charging as a service from 18% to 5%, but the final call will be taken by the GST Council, Tarun Kapoor, Advisor at the Prime Minister’s Office said on Tuesday.
Heavy Industries Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy also backed the industry demand for the GST cut.
“If you give me a representation we will look into it and pursue it with the Finance Ministry,” the Minister said in his address.
Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry’s (FICCI) Electric Vehicle Committee Chair Sulajja Firodia Motwani reiterated the industry demand for a reduction in Goods and Services Tax (GST) rates on electric vehicle (EV) batteries and charging services from 18% to 5%. “These changes will make EVs more competitive by lowering costs for consumers and incentivising greater adoption,” Ms. Motwani said.
Speaking on one of the key impediments in adoption of electric vehicles pertaining to the availability of charging infrastructure, Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Heavy Industries, Hanif Qureshi said his Ministry would soon finalise guidelines on allocation of subsidies to State governments for setting up charging stations under PM E drive. The scheme has an outlay of ₹2,000 crore for establishing a network of changing stations including 22,100 fast chargers for e-4Ws, 1,800 for e-buses, and 48,400 for e-2Ws and e-3Ws.
“State-level committees headed by Chief Secretaries will aggregate the demand for chargers and send us a proposal. We have to decide though whether subsidy has to be given for chargers or upstream infrastructure. The latter is a bigger challenge. We will be now giving 80% of the cost of the upstream infrastructure, which forms 50% of the cost of charging infrastructure,” said Mr. Qureshi.
Source : The Hindu
