"Biggest Phobia" About Electric Vehicles: Experts Give Their Take

Vehicles that run on electricity are the future but the technology is still in nascent stage. The need of the hour is to adopt it for public transport and alongside it, assuaging the concerns of customers, said a team of experts and entrepreneurs at the NDTV World Summit today. 

Speaking at the summit on "High Voltage Resolve: Electrifying Mobility in India for a Sustainable Tomorrow", a panel of experts agreed that given the environmental concerns, the time of EVs have come.

"In the next few years, EV will be the natural choice in terms of cost,' said Sanjeev Kulkarni, the Chief of BillionE Mobility, which calls itself a "one-stop shop for electric vehicles".

But while getting individual users to change their preferences is important, the tipping point will come when the public transport system switches to electricity. 

"The real big bang will be the public transport," said Ravin Mirchandani,  the Chief Executive Officer of Ador Digatron. "The way to clean up India's air is to focus on the two and three wheelers and then on the trucks and buses,' he explained.

Sanjeev Kulkarni agreed. "As a car user, it is more visible in the city. But we forget that our day starts with milk, which is delivered in a truck," he said. 

The amount of money that is flowing behind electric vehicles is phenomenal, the experts said. "The credit goes to the government of India - because of the consistency of policy," said Sandeep Gambhir, the chief of Vertelo, a firm that crafts electric mobility solutions. 

But when it comes to individual users, there is a hitch. While capital is very important, it is not the only concern, he pointed out.

"The biggest phobia about transportation is 'when I get there, will there be enough charge (in the car)," he said. 

"At the end of the day, any subsidy falls flat if the product is not good. The charging process has to be seamless," added Anshuman Divyanshu, the chief of Exicom, which offers EV charging facilities, promising to take it to new heights.