“We are developing electric car technology for India. But it might take us up to the next five years or more to manufacture and sell electric cars in the domestic market,” said Maruti Suzuki Managing Director Shinzo Nakanishi.

Maruti Suzuki Chairman R C Bhargava, added, “We are working on multi-fuel variants and some models have been identified for CNG. A CNG kit currently costs over Rs 40,000 [US$800] and that is expensive. Also, these cars can only be launched in 2010 or 2011, when there is a pan-India CNG filling system from companies like Reliance.’

Suzuki Motor Corporation of Japan holds 54.2% in Maruti Suzuki. Nakanishi said the R&D unit in Japan is currently addressing two key challenges in developing electric cars for India: mileage per charge and price.