Delhi Aims To Procure 8K Buses By 2025

Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday flagged off 400 electric buses taking the number of buses to 800 in the national capital. A total of INR 417 crore has been given by the Centre as subsidy and the AAP government will spend INR 3,674 crore.

The first Electric bus was flagged off in January 2022 in the national capital.

Speaking at the flag off ceremony, the chief minister said that the government is planning to procure a total of eight thousand electric buses for plying on the road to strengthen the public transport of the city.

He said, “There are total 800 electric buses in Delhi which is the highest number in the whole country. We are planning to induct total eight thousand electric buses by 2025. In the future there will be more than 10 thousand buses out of which 80 per cent will be electric buses. The world will recognise the national capital for its fleet of electric buses.”

Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena said that these 400 buses were the first batch of 1500 e-buses being provided by the central government.

“Flagged off 400 electric buses together with Hon’ble CM Arvind Kejriwal ji. These 400 buses are the first tranche of the 1500 e buses being provided by the government of India under the FAME-II scheme for creating a robust and green public transport infrastructure in Delhi,” Saxena wrote on X (Formerly Twitter).

Meanwhile, Delhi Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot who was also present there also expressed happiness on the launch and said, Flagged off 400 new electric buses ahead of the G20 Summit. We aim to provide the best and most comfortable public transport facilities to the people of Delhi.”

Delhi Electric Vehicle Policy

The EV policy of national capital aims to improve Delhi’s air quality and create an entire supply-chain ecosystem for this new segment of vehicles. In order to significantly benefit Delhi’s air quality, the policy intends to deploy 25 per cent of all new vehicles to be battery-operated vehicles by 2024.

The Delhi EV Policy has adopted a method of a combination of fiscal and non-fiscal incentives. While the fiscal incentive structure comprises purchase incentive, scrapping incentive on de-registration of old vehicles and interest waivers, the non-fiscal incentives addresses issues such as road-tax waivers, green-registration plates for EVs, license-fee waivers and single-window clearances.

Funding: The Delhi EV Policy has adopted the concept of “feebate” (by adopting measures by which inefficient or polluting vehicles incur a surcharge) to fund a high proportion of the demand incentives. The policy directs funding through sources like pollution cess, road tax, congestion tax, and other sources such as the environment compensation charge (ECC).

Creation of jobs: The EV Policy aims to promote about five lakh EVs in Delhi, it has immense potential to create a large number of jobs such as EV drivers, auto-mechanics, charging station operating staff, among others.