Ola Electric, one of the gigantic in the EV revolution is facing unprecedented challenges. It is unruly to fight this downfall amidst the EV surge in India. Along with Ola Electric, there are companies like PureEV, Okinawa, and Hero Electric that are facing the heat that came out of the EV fire incident. EV Fire incident not only pushes these companies back in the race but even brings massive loss to the families who faced these fires incident’s repercussions.
Ola electric catches fire in Pune, Chennai, and many other parts of the country and the only words that came out of Bavish Aggarwal, CEO of Ola Electric is that “We are looking into the root cause of the fire outbreaks and will come with possible solutions soon”.
Are our lives worth the wait? People are losing their lives and a mere word of mouth investigation of the problem won’t serve as a plausible solution to this cause.
When the consumers of Ola Electric were already fuming into the ashes of the previous incidents of EV Fire, another consumer took to Twitter to share an image of Ola’s e-scooter breakdown mid-road. The user claims, that the tire of the scooter breakdowns merely after crossing the speed breaker. Another user shared the image of the Ola S1 pro that shows the scooter’s front fork completely undone.
Govts’ Scrutiny; High Profile Exits from Ola Electric
In a set of tweets, Gadkari had earlier said, “Several mishaps involving electric two-wheelers have come to light in last two months. For the same government appointed the Centre for Fire, Explosive and Environment Safety ( CFEES ) and DRDO to invest in the recent fire EV outbreaks further last month.
The findings of the report submitted by DRDO & CFEES to the ministry of Union Road Transport and Highways were gut-wrenching & clear evidence of negligence at companies front.
According to the reports, Ola Electric and other companies have used “low-grade materials to cut cost” which causes serious defects in the battery packs and modules.
As the e-scooter maker, Ola faces the government investigation and is summoned by the government for the same. The company witnessed many high-profile exits back to back. Chief Marketing officer Varun Dubey quits. Earlier, Dinesh Radhakrishnan who was the chief technology officer (CTO) at Ola Electric moved on from the company. Ola Electric even recalled 1441 of its vehicle amid the rising outrage. It will be doing the pre-emptive diagnostics and quality checks before launching the products further.
These high-profile exits and sudden recalls through the back door are not the window of the solution for the consumer. While Ola Electric finds this issue less important to pay attention to, Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road Transport and highway himself took to Twitter to assure the e-scooter users that the companies at fault will be harshly penalized.
EV wheels are still at the trembling phase and companies like Ola Electric are making it even tougher to get stabilized. The forthcoming could be a better story for the consumers but right now they only feel and face losses while adopting to the transactional shift in the automotive industry.
