Need to promote electric vehicles: Gadkari

Nagpur: Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Friday said that electric vehicles need to be promoted in order to cut down expenses incurred on crude oil imports.

"E-vehicles need to be promoted in order to cut down the huge crude oil bill, reduce pollution and create cost effectiveness in transportation," Gadkari said at the launch of India's first multi-modal electric vehicle project at the airport complex here, according to a Road Transport and Highways Ministry release.

"To begin with, the emphasis would be on commercial vehicles and then on others," he said, adding that the project is in line with the central government's vision to make India a 100 percent e-vehicle nation.

In addition, Gadkari said that growing demand, coupled with R&D would help to bring down the operational and battery cost.

"Once the cost of batteries comes down, e-vehicles will compete with diesel and petrol vehicles and finally phase them out," he said.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis was also present to launch the project which enables passengers to book e-buses, e-cabs, e-rickshaws, and e-autos using mobile application Ola.