Tesla Is Coming To India And I Am Not Excited At All

Yesterday, Elon Musk Tweeted that Tesla will be bringing its much hyped electric cars to India this summer. A lot of thoughts came rushing to my mind, but none of them portrayed any excitement towards this announcement.

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love what Tesla stands for – A future where transportation is based on renewable resources . I also love the features that it comes with like autopilot, falcon wings etc. The problem lies in the fact that this model is not at all feasible for India in the near future.

Tesla has power stations to recharge your car throughout the US and claims to have 800 supercharging stations with over 5121 superchargers. This feat was achieved through several years of hard work. To Enter India, Tesla needs a similar network of Power Stations, if not more thanks to the population, to convince the customers to even consider buying their cars

Furthermore, To get the initial momentum started, Tesla offered free charging to Tesla buyers for life which basically meant that you need not spend anything to keep the car running except for your maintenance costs. This was very enticing, but this privilege has been done away with and new buyers will only get 1000 miles (~1600 Km) for free after which they will have to pay for recharging at any of the power stations, just like they refuelled their car at Petrol Pumps. One more disadvantage of this is that while refuelling your car took only 2-3 mins, recharging your car to 80% will take you about 45 minutes. 

One more thing to consider is that very few people in India actually have a garage to keep their cars, This becomes a major problem if you have to recharge your car daily at home. Where will the power supply and space to keep the charging station come from? This remains unanswered as of now.

Also, People in India often commute long distances in their cars (Think over 400 Km) and that simply would make your car run out of battery and the power station may not just be there. Yeah, You’re Stranded. 

Now when I come to the much acclaimed feature of Auto-Pilot, This will just be a mess here. Rash Drivers, Small uneven & rocky roads, Less than recommended gap between vehicles, untimely crossing of roads by people, are all things you will find on any common road in India. Forget Auto-Pilot, Even Elon Musk himself wouldn’t be able to drive any car here!

These are just some of the concerns that I have regarding Tesla’s venture in India. A lot of it will depend on whether Tesla modifies and adapts their cars according to India and their implementation in doing so. Price will also play an important role in its success. Would you buy a Tesla in your country? Comment Down Below.