Nitin Gadkari asks states to shift from 'harmful' diesel buses to alternate fuel

GANDHINAGAR: Union road transport minister Nitin Gadkari on Friday urged the Gujarat government and other state governments to discourage running diesel buses as these are harmful for the environment and people’s health. Urging the states to go for vehicles that can run on electricity and other green fuels, Gadkari said India should opt for indigenous fuels.
“We should decide that this country will run on clean and indigenous fuel, not on petrol and diesel (iss desh mein petrol-diesel nehin chalega, desh ka fuel chalega),” he said at the Investors’ Summit where the vehicle scrapping policy was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Gadkari also asked why we are not reducing import of petrol and diesel despite knowing their ill effects on human health. The minister said now a lot of work is going on to ramp up production of electricity from solar and wind energy, ethanol, methanol and hydrogen.
Earlier in the day, Modi also said be it ethanol, hydrogen fuel or electric mobility, with these priorities of the government, active participation of the industry is very important. “From R&D to infrastructure, the industry has to increase its partnership,” he said. The PM also asked them to have a roadmap for Aatmnirbhar Bharat for next 25 years.
Modi on Thursday chaired a high-level meeting on the harnessing potential of hydrogen as a fuel in the country. He has asked officers to work on the plan.