The much talked electric car from Nissan has been temporarily put off to 2011-2012. The initial launch is to be in the company’s homeland, Japan along with US, and Europe while China may also get the nod during the same period. Once the global launch is over, India may get along the car. The company is exploring all possibilities to launch the car in India at the earliest with the Indian government’s aid awaited.
The present tax rate, 110 import duty, will end up with the car’s price to be doubled. Further the car is designed to be an emission free, in need of full-fledged infrastructure for service and consensus among the central and state governments. Leaf, made known public, last month in Japan last month, will run for 160km on a single charge and would seek the price of gasoline-run cars sans the battery cost. Despite Nissan’s speed break, other companies are at the verge of going ahead with their projects on electric cars.
Bangalore-based Reva Electric car company is in the lead with selling 3000 cars ever since its launch in 2001 of which 50% local market and the other 50% in overseas. With this potential, the company is launching two more models at the Frankfurt Motor Show; the company has the plan to initiate a production factory with the capacity of 30000 units. Tata, for its part, is in tie-up with a Norwegian company Miljobil, in introducing electric version of Indica cars. Tata too faces the cost factor in manufacturing electric cars in India.