Electric Vehicles: Public Transport Permit Mandatory For Commercial EVs To Avail Incentives Under FAME II

New Delhi: Starting April 1, the owners of commercial electric vehicles (three wheelers and four wheelers) will be required to have a public transport permit from a government agency in order to avail the benefits under the second phase of Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid) and Electric Vehicles (FAME II) scheme. FAME II scheme which was launched on February 28 by the Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises (MoHIPE), will start operating from April 1, 2019. The scheme is proposed to be implemented over a period of three years. The incentives under the scheme include subsidies to buyers on the purchase of vehicles along with other benefits like exemptions in roads tax, registrations fees, and parking fee.

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The public transport permit required for electric three wheelers and four wheelers needs to state that the vehicle will be used only for public transport purposes and not for private use. The guidelines of FAME II require that the vehicle dealers ensure that the incentives are passed on to individuals using vehicles only for commercial use in case of three wheelers and four wheelers. This is because FAME II aims to encourage the use of electric vehicles as public and commercial transports.

However, for electric two-wheelers incentives are also applicable for privately owned vehicles in addition to those used for public transport or for commercial purposes.

The guidelines also say,

A dealer should ensure that only one vehicle per category per person is allowed to claim demand incentives. No individual person can purchase more than one vehicle of the same category and claim incentives under the scheme. However, there will be no restrictions for the number of vehicles to be purchased by other than individual categories of buyers.

The second phase of the FAME scheme, which has a total outlay of Rs. 10,000 crore aims to boost clean mobility in public transport. It aims to support five lakh electric three-wheelers having ex-factory price (price excluding taxes and delivery cost) of up to Rs. 5 lakh with an incentive of Rs. 50,000 each. It will also offer a subsidy of up to Rs. 1.5 lakh each to 55,000 commercial electric four-wheelers with an ex-factory price of up to Rs. 15 lakh.

FAME II is an extended version of FAME I which was launched in 2015 to push for faster adoption of electric mobility by incentivising electric vehicles. FAME II lays special focus on public and shared transports and aims to develop an ecosystem for electric vehicles in the country by incentivising the EVs and building a robust charging infrastructure.

Also Read: Electric Vehicles: Government Prepares Blueprint To Boost Localised Making Of Battery-Run Transports

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