Govt floats tender for 100 e-charging points

THE CHARGING STATIONS WILL BE FOR BOTH TWOAND FOURWHEELERS. MOST OF THE CHOSEN SITES ARE LOCATED OUTSIDE METRO STATIONS

NEW DELHI: A day after Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal launched a campaign to promote electric vehicles (EV) in the capital city, the Delhi government on Friday floated a tender to hire an agency for setting up 500 e-vehicle charging points across 100 locations within a year, informed power minister Satyendar Jain.

Jain said the charging stations will be for both two-wheelers and four-wheelers, both private and commercial. Most of the chosen sites are located outside Metro stations and at bus depots in the city, he said.

Jain further said, “This is the largest tender for public charging in India… We are working relentlessly towards the vision of making Delhi the EV capital of India. For the charging station project, the full power infrastructure cost will be borne by the Delhi government. Some of these charging stations will also double up as battery swapping stations. At least 20% of them will have the slower variety of chargers and 10% will have the faster variety in order to cater to all kinds of e-vehicles,” said Jain at a press conference on Friday.

In a press statement, the Dialogue and Development Commission, a think tank of the Delhi government, said, “The ‘Switch Delhi’ campaign launched by CM Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday is a mass awareness campaign to sensitise each and every Delhi resident about the benefits of switching to e-vehicles. Under the policy, the government has offered multiple financial and non-financial incentives to accelerate the adoption of EVS in the capital. Industry leaders continue to hail the campaign and they have shown tremendous support to CM Arvind Kejriwal’s appeal.”

While launching the campaign on Thursday, Kejriwal had said that his government will, in the next six months, change its policy to lease only electric cars as part of an effort to accelerate the adoption of electric cars in the city.

The government launched the campaign to inform, encourage and motivate every person in Delhi to switch from polluting vehicles to zero-emission EVS. All the hired cars being engaged by various departments of the Delhi government will switch to EVS within six months.