Elon Musk is making headlines nearly every day for the past few days for varied reasons – Tesla becoming the most valued automobile company, SpaceX’s successful blastoff, red satin shorts, him becoming the seventh richest billionaire in the world. And now, a little tweet has got him and Tesla trending in India. While Musk has hinted at several occasions that Tesla would make its debut in India ‘soon’, it has been said again as a revert to a customer in India who booked a Tesla Model 3 some four years ago.
In July last year, in interaction with IIT Madras students Musk had stated Tesla electric cars may run on bumpy Indian roads by 2020. Musk also tweeted in March 2019 that he ‘would love to be in the country (India) in 2019 or next year’.
Sorry, should hopefully be soon!
Also Read— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 10, 2020
Moving back and forth on Tesla’s India dream, Elon Musk has in the past pointed to the Indian government’s policies and criticised FDI norms that are causing a delay in the electric car company’s debut in the country. “Would love to be in India. Some challenging government regulations, unfortunately,” Musk had tweeted.
Currently, the only Asian market where Tesla retails its electric cars is China. Tesla is, however, looking to set up its second gigafactory outside China. The Tami Nadu government last month wrote to several automobile companies, including Tesla, to set up shop in the state.
Also read: Tesla Model 3 rams into crashed truck: Raises questions on Autopilot system
Tesla Model 3 is the most affordable electric car in the American manufacturer’s product lineup. It has a claimed range of 480 km and a 0-100 kph sprint time of under six seconds.
For a developing electric car market like India, Tesla aims to introduce its lineup with maximum localisation which will take longer. The introduction of a car like Model 3 would make sense for the country if launched at a competitive price tag. Such manufacturers would need incentives from the government bodies so new technologies are made available for the mass market as well as affordable.
