Over the past few months, electric scooters in India have taken the centre stage in terms of headlines as there have been a scary number of cases of the vehicles catching fire out of nowhere. All across the country, people have faced the problem of their electric scooter catching fire out of nowhere and some even just failing, as it would fail to travel the promised distance before the battery runs out of charge.
This has left scores of customers all over the nation dismayed and unsatisfied with the product they have purchased as people have questioned the safety of electric scooters in India. This caused an initial federal probe on the reasoning behind all of this.
Malfunctioning battery cells along with modules have been pin pointed as the most likely cause for electric scooters catching ablaze in the country according to some government officials working with the probe.
Three different companies that produce electric scooters were investigated which included Ola Electric. Ola Electric, especially has been in the news recently in multiple occasions for catching fire randomly and even losing charge after travelling very short distances.
The public statement issued by investigation agency revealed that the battery cells and the system that manages the battery were both problematic which is the reason for the scooter’s problems.
It was just under two months ago when a father and daughter duo were killed by their electric scooter catching fire which caused the government of India to initiate an investigation into it. Recently, a truck carrying many scooters caught fire as the scooters inside overheated and went up in flames.
Many experts have said that the technology and methods used to make electric bikes and scooters in India have been taken from the Western countries which is a problem as this method of production and batteries just are not suited for the hotter and harsher Indian weather.
India has set a goal of 4 out of 5 two wheelers sold in the country to be electric by the turn of the decade. Currently, that number stands at just under 2%. The country has a long way to go to reach that number as Indian companies first need to make consistently reliable and safer electric two wheelers if they want the market to boom. Currently, with the price of petrol and diesel skyrocketing, people are turning to electric but are in limbo with the state of electric vehicles in the country. The government should work with electric vehicle firms to resolve this issue as soon as possible if they are to hit their end of decade goals.
