The Delhi government today announced that it has awarded tenders for 500 charging points. The tender was floated by Delhi Transco Limited, the State Nodal Agency for setting up Electric Vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure in Delhi, said Satyendra Jain, Delhi Power Minister in a press conference.

The Power Minister stated — 100 public charging stations with 500 charging points will be developed across Delhi in the next 3 months and will be open to the public by June 27, 2022.

EV owners will be charged under Rs 2/unit for charging their vehicle compared to Rs 10-15/unit in other states.

“Bidding criteria was kept as lowest service charge; users will be heavily incentivised because of the minus Rs 3.60/unit service charge that was discovered during the competitive bidding process,” he said.

Chairperson of Delhi government’s Charging Infrastructure Working Group, Jasmine Shah stated, “This was the largest tender of its kind in India, and it doubles the EV charging infrastructure of Delhi.”

The guiding framework for the tender was developed by the “Charging Infrastructure Working Group” of Delhi government which had representation from the power department, transport department, all municipal corporations, and all the DISCOMs of Delhi.

Jain said, “Last month, EVs contributed to more than 10% of the total vehicle sales in Delhi. The electric vehicle policy launched by the Delhi Government last year aimed to develop electric charging stations for public use within 3-kilometre of travel anywhere in the national capital.”

“Towards this, Delhi Transco Limited (the state Nodal agency) initiated a tender to establish 100 charging stations with 500 charging points at prime locations across Delhi. 71 of these stations will be established at metro stations. The bidding process was drafted in a PPP model. It had two distinguished areas where the government has contributed: first in providing land through different land owning agencies; and second in providing high-side infrastructure including cabling and transmission. The private player would contribute with the smart charging stations, staff and servicing,” added Jain.