Delhi's e-auto scheme - moving at a snail’s pace

According to Vaahan data, only 279 of 4261 units were registered as of July 06; the current deadline is July 31.

Delhi government has launched its electric auto-rickshaws scheme to bring more electric rickshaws on the road under its subsidy program but only a few people have registered till now. The Kejriwal government is trying to reduce pollution in Delhi, which is the most populated auto-rickshaw city in India.

They are introducing 4261 e-rickshaws in Delhi, to control some sort of pollution. In future, it will increase more in number for better control on pollution.

This is the last month to register for the scheme but only 1/10 of the people means 279 have registered so far out of 4261. This scheme was launched by Kejriwal last year in October, after the extension, only a few days of this month are left to register for this scheme.

The Kejriwal government has given reservations to women to register for this scheme. They have 33% reservation, which means 1406 are the e-rickshaws to be given to women under this scheme. Till now only a dozen women drivers have registered under this scheme.

Any citizen from Delhi, who is a resident is eligible under the scheme. He should have a valid light motor vehicle license. When the Delhi government launched this scheme, it received more than 20,000 applications. The last date to apply for this vehicle scheme was April 2022. But now the government has extended to apply application till July 2022.

The manufacturer of e-auto rickshaws told the government to dispatch before the end of July as many as possible but the target may get missed if the date is not extended.

According to the Vahan website, 279 e-autos have been sold to date, including 215, were manufactured by Piaggio and 64, were manufactured by Mahindra Reva Electric automobiles.

The auto-rickshaw union has cited misconceptions about e-autos and high credit rates for buying electric vehicles as the causes of the lackluster response, while government authorities have highlighted "supply issues" as the issue. The computerized lotteries for the allocation of 4,261 e-autos were conducted on February 14; the registration deadline was July 31.

Instead of providing such a golden opportunity to Delhi auto drivers, there are a smaller number of applications received than was expected. There are various reasons which came into notice for weak responses but the main reason is the shortage of charging stations in the city.

But the government has said they have already 1400+ charging stations owned by private firms. Besides this, the government is trying to bring 500+ more public charging stations. Kejriwal's government is trying to provide one charging station within a radius of 3km.

The Delhi government is also Building infrastructure at a bus stop to facilitate a public charging station.

To increase the number of vehicles, Rakesh Aggarwal has appealed High court of Delhi, that this scheme should be for more residents instead of badge holder drivers only.

Supreme Court has passed its order and said that the number of e auto rickshaw will be same 4261, no more will come on the road till now. But the government has said that it will bring more e-auto rickshaws to the maximum number of e auto-rickshaw in Delhi after securely delivering all these existing e-auto rickshaws to their owners under the e-auto rickshaw scheme.