43 slots left, UT may stop fuel 2-wheeler registration today

Chandigarh, October 28

The UT Administration may halt the registration of internal combustion engine (ICE) two-wheelers tomorrow as the slot for registration of only 43 vehicles was left today for the financial year 2023-24.

After the Administration revised Electric Vehicle (EV) Policy on October 18, the quota for registration of non-electric two-wheelers was extended by 1,609 units for the financial year. However, the quota is likely to be exhausted by tomorrow, as only room for sale of nearly 43 vehicles was left.

EV policy revised on Oct 18

The UT Administration had revised its electric vehicle (EV) policy on October 18, reducing the registration target for such two-wheelers to 15 per cent for the financial year 2023-24, down from the previous 25 per cent. This means that an additional 1,609 non-electric two-wheelers could be registered till March 31 next year.

The city has 10 automobile dealers who collectively sell around 20,000 non-electric two-wheelers annually, nearly 1,600 each month. During the festival season, this number can surge to around 4,000 per month.

The UT Administration had revised its electric vehicle (EV) policy on October 18, reducing the registration target for such two-wheelers to 15 per cent for the financial year 2023-24, down from the previous 25 per cent. This means that an additional 1,609 non-electric two-wheelers could be registered till March 31 next year. The registration target for personal electric cars was also lowered to 12 per cent from the previous 25 per cent.

The Registering and Licencing Authority (RLA) had stopped the registration of two-wheelers running on ICE on achieving the target fixed for 2023-24 in the EV Policy on October 6.

According to the target, only 12,076 two-wheelers running on petrol have to be registered in the city till March 31 next year. However, the target was achieved around on October 6 and after that, their registration was stopped.

The UT Administration rolled out the EV Policy on September 20, 2022.

Earlier, on achieving the target, the UT Administration had also stopped the registration of non-electric two-wheelers from February 10 to March 31 for the 2022-23 financial year.

According to the data available from September 20, 2022, till September 18 this year, a total of 19,592 non-electric two-wheelers were registered against 1,807 electric two-wheelers. Similarly, 26,372 non-electric four-wheelers were registered against 752 electric and 263 strong hybrid vehicles during the period.

After criticism from stakeholders, the UT Administration had revised its Electric Vehicle (EV) Policy in the first week of July and reduced the registration target for electric two-wheelers. The target had been reduced to 35 per cent from the previous 70 per cent to be achieved in 2023-24.

The Electric Vehicle Policy-2022 was approved to make Chandigarh a “Model EV City” by achieving one of the highest penetrations of zero-emission vehicles within the policy period of five years.