Elon Musk wished a ‘speedy recovery’ by Modi minister

But the entrepreneur was lacking in motion on Monday when India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, dispatched a senior member of his authorities within the midst of spiritual Diwali festivities to meet with the tycoon at his Fremont manufacturing unit in California on Monday.

Why the Tesla CEO was a no-show shouldn’t be precisely clear, however India’s minister of business and commerce might have inadvertently let slip the trigger.

“I want him a speedy restoration,” Piyush Goyal posted to social media, including he missed Musk’s “magnetic presence” throughout his tour of Tesla’s second largest manufacturing plant.  

Musk, who relayed his apologies and pledged to make it as much as Modi’s minister, has complained of severe back pain in latest months in connection together with his intense work schedule as he fought to avoid wasting Twitter from chapter. 

In August, Musk revealed the necessity for “minor surgical procedure” to appropriate an issue during which his proper shoulder blade rubbed up in opposition to his rib cage. 

“Restoration will solely take just a few months,” he wrote on the time. 

It was an honor to have you ever go to Tesla!

My apologies for not with the ability to journey to California at this time, however I sit up for assembly at a future date.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 14, 2023

Tesla and the Modi authorities are trying to strike a win-win deal that might see the world’s most precious carmaker arrange a car manufacturing plant in India as a part of its entry into the nation. It will be the sixth Tesla manufacturing unit after Musk disclosed plans in March to build his next gigafactory in Mexico for his upcoming entry EV touted to price $25,000 when it goes on sale at an undisclosed date. 

Enormous development in India’s automobile market because the pandemic

India is a first-rate goal for Tesla having eclipsed Japan final yr to turn into the third largest marketplace for passenger vehicles. In accordance with industry data, some 3.79 million autos have been registered new in 2022, accounting for a share of roughly 5.3% of worldwide automobile demand. 

Whereas good points have since slowed from its breakneck tempo through the first 9 months of this yr, India continues to be 40% above the identical interval from 2019. By comparability, Japan is 12% beneath pre-crisis ranges and the hole is even barely greater in Germany, the fifth largest market, which is down 13%.

Regardless of India’s booming inhabitants and hungry demand for mobility, the federal government erected punitively excessive tariff boundaries as a way of encouraging native funding, which has impeded Tesla’s entry for years. 

All vehicles imported in a completely completed state into the nation, EVs included, are chargeable for a minimal 70% import responsibility. These price greater than $40,000 will see the complete worth of the car tacked on as tax on high, that means solely very rich Indian shopper may afford a Tesla. 

Financial reformer Modi faces basic elections

Modi’s Hindu nationalist BJP celebration faces off in opposition to the Congress celebration typically elections anticipated to be held within the spring of subsequent yr, nonetheless. A prestigious billion-dollar funding by Musk would go a great distance in bolstering the prime minister’s popularity as an financial reformer. 

Consequently, his authorities is contemplating whether or not to scale back the punitive import tariffs—elevated solely earlier this year for mass market autos—to a flat price of 15% that will apply to all electrical autos, together with these from Tesla’s low-cost rivals like BYD in neighboring China. 

For Modi’s business minister, the jaunt to San Francisco in the course of the Hindu competition of Diwali wasn’t a complete loss at the very least. 

Goyal was nonetheless capable of meet with U.S. Commerce Consultant Katherine Tai to coordinate insurance policies forward of February’s essential World Commerce Group convention usually held each different yr.