Key Points
For all the policy promotion of electric vehicles (EVs), their sales figures in India have been a disappointment as far as four-wheelers go..
This may explain why transport minister Nitin Gadkari has sent a proposal to the finance ministry, as reported, to place hybrids in the same 5% GST bracket as EVs..
Currently, hybrids are taxed at par with fossil-fuelled vehicles: at the top GST rate of 28%, that is, with a cess levied on top of that, taking the effective levy higher..
The premise for treating hybrids like regular combustion cars was that they do not fully eliminate the use of fossil fuels, even if they stretch the distance every litre of a fuel-refill takes them..
For one, hybrids that use both batteries and pistons to move wheels not only reduce demand for petrol or dieseland thus compress carbon emissionsthey induce no anxiety over being stranded without charge..
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