News

Volume 6 Issue 12 - December 01, 2009

No disabled friendly cars rolling out of Indian car manufacturing units

D.N.I.S. News Network, India: While overseas car units like Toyota, Nissan, Suzuki and Ford are consistently rolling out disabled friendly cars from their manufacturing units, no car manufacturer has plans to do the same for disabled people in India. The government may have come up with reduced excise rates and tax waivers, but there seems to be no takers.

Maruti Udyog Limited had in the past (1987-1993) manufactured limited number of disabled friendly Maruti 800 C.C. cars but discontinued production. Initially the problem was the high excise duty levied on production of such cars. Over the years, excise duty has come down drastically from 40 percent to 8 percent, but most car makers still don’t seem to be interested in manufacturing cars for disabled people.

Arun Yadav, Minister of State for Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises said that the government has asked car manufacturers in India to concentrate on making at least one or two models for disabled persons. But the possibility of disabled friendly cars hitting the Indian road is as of now caught in a terrible jam!