Clean mobility powered by clean energy is the most potent weapon in India’s fight against climate Change, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the inauguration of MOVE, a global mobility summit organised by the government think-tank NITI Aayog.
“Clean mobility powered by clean energy is our most powerful weapon in our fight against Climate Change. This means a pollution-free clean drive, leading to clean air and better living standards for our people…We should champion the idea of ‘clean kilometres’,” he said in his address at Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi.
Highlighting his government’s commitment to push development of clean mobility technologies in the country, the Prime Minister said that charged mobility is the way forward. “We want to drive investments across the value chain from batteries to smart charging to electric vehicle manufacturing. India’s entrepreneurs and manufacturers are now poised to develop and deploy break-through battery technology,” he said.
Given the increasing problem of traffic congestion in Indian cities and towns, congestion-free mobility is critical to check the economic and environmental costs of congestion. “There should be an emphasis on de-bottlenecking of networks…This would result in fewer traffic jams and lower levels of stress for commuters,” the Prime Minister said.
On ensuring safety, affordability and accessibility of mobility, Prime Minister Modi said that convenient mobility means safe, affordable and accessible for all sections of the society. “This includes the elderly, the women and the specially-abled.”
Calling for leveraging the full potential for vehicle pooling to improve private vehicle utilisation, he said that Internet-enabled connected sharing economy is emerging as the fulcrum of mobility. “Connected mobility implies integration of geographies as well as modes of transport,” the Prime Minister averred.
