The day has already come; welcome to the Bharat Stage 6 era! All the vehicles that will be sold in the country will have to adhere to the much stricter emission norms (barring a few leftovers from BS4). This is an unprecedented feat that we have achieved. Let us list a few very important and interesting pointers so that you know the significance…
In a natural progression, we would have moved to BS5 norms from the older BS4 regulations which were implemented just three years ago! And the BS6 emission norms were initially planned to be implemented in 2024!
However, we decided to skip BS5 and go ahead with BS6 – That is full four years ahead of schedule! That is asking a lot from makers. Initially, there were a few which were skeptic and thought it to be impossible.
However, flip forward to today and almost every maker has made it to these greener times. We should give it to all the auto makers who accepted the challenge and through their unflinching commitment moved to norms which are the toughest in the world. For this transition, the industry invested amounts of Rs 70,000 crores or more!
More than 1000 models/variants of vehicles were to be transitioned in a matter of only three years and most of them have swapped over!
Mr Rajan Wadhera, President of SIAM (Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers) calls these times unprecedented and says,
It is unprecedented anywhere in the world to switch to such stringent emission regime on one single day, for all categories of vehicles including, Two-Wheelers, Three-Wheelers, Passenger Vehicles, Trucks and Buses. I do compliment my fellow industry colleagues for this outstanding achievement in meeting BS VI emission norms despite facing huge challenges of technology, time and resources.
Where do we stand now?
- Our overall emission norms are among the most stringent across the globe already!
- For two-wheelers specifically, we are even ahead of Europe (which goes to Euro 6 in 2021) and Japan (which moves to these levels in 2022). Bharat Stage 6 norms are roughly similar to the international EURO 6 emissions.
So, the next time you ride your BS6 motorcycle, feel good about the fact that it is the most environment friendly, greenest vehicle in the world!!!
