E-vehicles to run Uttar Pradesh's city bus services, says Yogi Adityanath

In the backdrop of Niti Aayog proposing to electrify all vehicles by 2030 under a new national mobility policy, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday announced to develop an e-vehicle hub in the Agra-Delhi industrial corridor.

“We want to develop an e-vehicle hub in the Agra-Delhi region and the state government would make the required land available for the purpose,” Adityanath said while addressing a function organised by automotive major Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) to launch its new range of e-vehicles. He said the e-vehicle segment had large development potential in India, especially UP due to the large consumer base.

“The promotion of electric vehicles would not only check air pollution and provide convenient urban mass transportation, but save precious foreign exchange needed for oil imports,” he added.

Adityanath further announced that the government had decided to run UP city bus services using e-vehicles and informed that order for 40 electric buses for Lucknow city bus service had already been placed.

However, the CM called upon the e-vehicle manufacturers to upgrade their technology and brace up for the local and global challenges for making their products cheaper and convincing people to opt for e-vehicles for personal and mass mobility.

Adityanath also called upon M&M to come forward for operating the city bus services in UP using e-vehicles.

Referring to the forthcoming ‘UP Investors’ Summit’ on 21-22 February 2018 in Lucknow, the CM said the state was giving final touches to its e-vehicles roadmap to be showcased at the big ticket event. “One of the focus areas at the Summit would be e-vehicles.”

The proposed UP mobility and logistics policy would entail the establishment of industrial parks in the state to leverage the potential of eastern and western freight corridors, besides other industrial corridors passing through UP.

Earlier, the Adityanath government has proclaimed Noida, Greater Noida and Yamuna Expressway as Electronics Manufacturing Zone under UP Electronics Manufacturing Policy, which aims at projecting UP as electronics manufacturing hub. Under ESDM (Electronic System Design & Manufacturing), UP is targetting investment of Rs 200 billion and 3,00,000 new jobs over the next few years.

Meanwhile, Mahindra Electric CEO Mahesh Babu told Business Standard UP was one of the leading states to be working on its e-vehicles policy. “Given the fact that UP is one of the largest markets, it is encouraging for the private sector that the state is working on e-vehicles roadmap, which would help the companies, usher in transparency and improve quality of services.”

Commenting on the proposed e-vehicles hub in Agra-Delhi region, Babu noted it would not only boost the socioeconomics in the region but communicate positively about India globally since the area flanked the National Capital Region (NCR) and formed part of the most popular tourist circuit of Taj Mahal.