Electric two-wheeler giant Ola Electric will give nearly 1 lakh customers who bought Ola S1 Pro electric bikes by March 30, 2023, a refund of about Rs 130 crore. The cost of chargers that were sold separately from the bikes will be covered by this refund.
The government also stopped looking into whether Ola Electric overcharged for its electric two-wheelers after the company agreed to give users their money back for the EV charger, which was billed separately. Ola, on the other hand, hasn’t said anything about this.
What was the case?
For those who don’t know, under its FAME 2 plan, the Union Ministry of Heavy Industries helps pay for electric two-wheelers by giving a subsidy of up to 40% of the cost of locally made vehicles. But this incentive scheme only works for the first one million electric two-wheelers that cost less than Rs 1.5 lakh each.
So, in order to get the subsidy, some makers charged customers separately for their chargers and proprietary software in order to keep their cars in line with the rules for getting the subsidy. This caused the Ministry of Heavy Industries to look into it, and as a result, the government stopped giving subsidies to EV makers like Ola Electric. Now that the investigation is over, the government will soon give Ola about Rs 500 crores in payments that were held up because of the investigation.
The Ministry of Heavy Industries is also looking at Ather, Hero Vida, and TVS Motor Company, in addition to Ola Electric.
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