New York sources have reported that Chairman Anand Mahindra said Ford Motor and its Indian partner Mahindra & Mahindra could create their own electric car line in the country to help battle pollution from the vehicles clogging India’s roads, Mahindra & Mahindra, which already sells the e2o micro electric car, would be open to creating a new electric vehicle line in India with Ford, Mahindra said following the opening of a factory in Auburn Hills, Michigan, to produce an off-road vehicle for the US market.
Meanwhile Ford said earlier this month it will create a new electric car line in China with its partner there, Anhui Zotye Automobile. Accordingly “India could be the other location for doing that,” Anand Mahindra said Monday when asked if Ford’s plan to create an EV line-up with its Chinese partner could be replicated in India. “In India, it may just happen because of a crisis of congestion and pollution, which is why the government there said we want every car to be electric by 2030, which is outrageously ambitious.”
Moreover the
partners are still studying what to collaborate on, but Mahindra said electric
cars have been central to the conversation since he negotiated the alliance
with executive chairman Bill Ford. A spokesman for Ford didn’t immediately
respond to a request for comment.
