New Delhi. To promote green mobility in the country, the lack of charging infrastructure will be removed. Within the next few months, work will be started rapidly by the state governments towards making charging points and stations because after a long exercise, the Energy Ministry has revised the prices of goods used at charging stations. Now state governments will be able to start the work of building charging stations through the nodal agency.

PM e-drive scheme
Last year, the Central Government made a provision of Rs 2,000 crore for preparing charging infrastructure under the PM e-Drive scheme. Under this, up to 100 percent subsidy will be provided to the states on the expenses incurred on charging stations, but the states argue that the rates for charging stations were fixed many years ago, since then the prices of the products used in preparing charging stations have increased, hence new prices should be determined.

After this, the Heavy Industries Ministry had handed over the responsibility of estimating the new rates to the Energy Ministry. Dr. Hanif Qureshi, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Heavy Industries, says that the revised rates have been received from the Energy Ministry which have been provided to the state governments. Now the states will soon work towards building charging stations. He said that the government estimates that by the year 2030, the number of electric vehicles in the country will be above 10 percent. In such a situation, more than 72 thousand public charging stations are to be built across the country.

Investment got a boost under the scheme
The PLI Auto Scheme, launched to promote the manufacturing of advanced automobile technology in the country, is increasing investment rapidly. So far, Rs 35,657 crore has been invested under the scheme, while incentive amount of Rs 2321.94 crore has been released to the companies.

The total budget for the scheme launched for five years from the year 2023-24 is Rs 25938 crore. Under this, an incentive amount of Rs 322 crore was given to four approved companies in the financial year 2024–25. At the same time, a total of Rs 1,999 crore has been released to five companies so far for the financial year 2024–25.

Keep in mind that under the scheme, only those products are given incentives which have at least 50 percent domestic value addition. So far, eight applicants from the Original Equipment Manufacturer category have been granted domestic value addition certification for 94 variants and 10 applicants from the Component category have been granted domestic value addition certification for 37 variants.