Priyans Murarka bought his MG ZS EV back in 2022. Four years and several intercity trips later, he has watched the charging network improve, slowly, but unevenly. He has mastered the workarounds that EV owners quietly trade among themselves: juggling multiple apps, mentally mapping the vehicle's range, and hoping the charger is actually working. "You learn the tips and tricks over time," he told The Core.

"New expressways do not have adequate charging networks yet. Even the ones that are there barely work or are always booked, never vacant,” Murarka said, recounting a recent road trip from Delhi to Mumbai.

India sold 24.52 lakh electric vehicles (EVs) across all categories in FY2025-26, including 1.99 lakh passenger vehicles, 14 lakh two-wheelers, 8.30 lakh three-wheelers, and over 19,000 buses, according to data from the Federation of Automobile Dealers Association.

Across the country, driving an EV beyond city limits has come a long way, but it still remains an exercise in planning, patience, and a degree of faith that the charger shown on the map will be operational, that it won't already be occupied, and that it will actually work when you plug in.

The Gap Persists

The latest government data for the last five year period, updated to December 2025, suggests 29,151 EV charging stations were installed nationwide. Of this, slow charging stations have the higher share of 20,346, followed by 8,805 fast charging stations.

This is still far too few charging stations for the number of EVs on the road, a gap that fuels long wait times and range anxiety. Two and three-wheeler fleets have found a partial workaround, emerging as early adopters of a hybrid operational model that blends battery swapping with conventional charging. But for four-wheeler owners, battery-as-a-service has seen little uptake.

In the October to December and January to March period, the industry installed approximately 1,000 Combined Charging System (CCS2) chargers in each quarter. This was, however, one-third lower than additions in the preceding two quarters, according to Murarka, who analysed the development in his ExpWithEVs blog.

The geographical breakdown reveals that the southern region leads in charging infrastructure compared to the northern region.

CCS2 is a DC fast-charging standard delivering 50kW to 350kW, preferred by passenger vehicles and buses and now the de facto standard at highways. Type 2 is an AC connector delivering 3.5kW to 22kW, most commonly found in homes and workplaces.

Market Hesitations

Setting up a charging station requires three things in alignment — land, power infrastructure, and hardware and software. Getting all three right, at scale, is where the challenge lies. And even when they do, the question of whether the business can turn a profit looms just as large.

Kartikey Hariyani, CEO of a private charger point operator (CPO) ChargeZone, points to higher capex, including skyrocketing property costs, as one of the two primary structural barriers.

“The other is the substantial one-time deposit required by electricity distribution companies, which ranges from Rs 30 lakh to Rs 70 lakh depending on the load required,” he told The Core.

The policy landscape also adds a layer of unevenness. “While 11 states have waived recurring monthly fixed demand charges for CPOs, the rest continue to levy them, creating a patchwork of economics that makes national-scale expansion difficult to plan,” Hariyani said.

Slow initial returns also remain a persistent deterrent. DC fast chargers require significantly higher capital, typically 10 to 12 times more than an AC charger setup. "Beyond the charger itself, there's a need for high-capacity grid connections, transformers, heavy-duty cabling, and integrated cooling systems. These installations typically start in the range of several lakhs,” Raman Bhatia, Managing Director at Servotech Renewable Power Systems, told The Core. Servotech is one of the major charging hardware providers, supplying equipment to PSUs.

He added that the annual Maintenance Contracts (AMC) costs for DC fast chargers typically run anywhere from high single digits to low double digits annually, structured as a percentage of hardware value, not a flat fee.

That percentage covers 24/7 remote monitoring, preventive maintenance, software updates, and critical spare replacements. Given the exposure to cable damage, vandalism, and round-the-clock usage, it is often the only realistic path to maintaining uptime close to 99%.

For smaller franchise owners, however, it is a recurring burden stacked on top of already heavy upfront investments. Yet the cost of skipping it can far exceed the contract fee itself, Bhatia said.

Real estate dynamics is another quiet bottleneck in EV charging rollout. In many high-value retail and office developments, prime frontage and premium parking spots are being held back for higher-yield tenants, including quick service restaurant chains and retail brands that generate faster returns. Shriram PM Monga, Co-founder of SRED, a commercial and retail leasing advisory firm, has a term for it: land-locking.

"CPOs offer moderate initial yields and typically require long-term agreements that developers find restrictive," he told The Core.

But there are signs of change. Grade-A commercial developers in Tier-1 cities are already moving differently, setting aside 5% to 10% of parking capacity for EV charging and forging early partnerships with CPOs, a shift Monga expects to become mainstream by the next two to three years.

The OMC Lag

Industry insiders tracking the sector suggest that private players dominate the overall public charging network, accounting for approximately over 60% share, while oil marketing companies (OMCs) make up the remaining less than 40%.

In the last five years, government data suggests OMCs have installed 27,737 EV public charging stations (EVPCS), but only 22,753 are operational.

Among public-sector players seeking to close the infrastructure gap, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) has the widest coverage. In response to queries from The Core, India’s second-largest fuel retailer said that as of April 1, it has installed 6,823 chargers of various types and capacities across the country, and its main focus area is highways.

Of these, approximately 5,500 chargers are currently operational, spanning DC fast chargers, AC chargers, and battery swapping stations. The remaining units are pending electrical connections from local distribution companies.

On pricing, PSUs including BPCL, Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), and Indian Oil (IOCL), tend to be lower ranging from Rs 14 to Rs 20 per unit, than private players like ChargeZone, Tata Power and Statiq at Rs 18 to Rs 40 per unit. This could be a driving factor for most EV owners.

But that’s not the case. The major concern is finding a working one when needed, consumers say.

BPCL’s utilisation rate stands at 1%. "Over the past year, charger usage has shown an upward trend. However, overall utilisation remains low, at approximately 1%," a company spokesperson told The Core, attributing it primarily to the relatively small number of EVs on the road.

Conversely, Hariyani told The Core that the utilisation rate for its charging points is at 14%.

From a consumer perspective, a single unsatisfactory experience is often enough to mentally write off a charging station for future.

According to Amit Bhatt, Managing Director–India at the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), a business model that could work is creating hubs. This would be a cluster of a minimum of four to six charging points where multiple vehicles can charge simultaneously.

The Unprofitable Wait

Another bottleneck is fundamental to how fuel retail has always worked. Traditional petrol pumps are built around dispensing, which takes a matter of minutes. EV fast charging, by contrast, requires 30 to 45 minutes. That gap in dwell time changes everything.

"Oil marketing companies get no incentives for the time a charger is occupied, unlike fuel sales which turn around quickly. This makes EV charging an unprofitable business for OMCs, one that has largely been government-pushed rather than market-driven," said Bhatt.

Arvinder Singh Sahney, Chairman of IOCL, acknowledged that while the company has built an extensive EV charging network, the business model remains limited.

"Charging stations are not a very big revenue model for me because I don't have a very big stake in the total value chain," he told The Core Report in January this year.

Sahney pointed to the gap plainly: IOCL is absent from both ends of the EV value chain including power generation on one side, and battery manufacturing and critical minerals on the other. Unlike its fossil fuel business, where the company commands significant value across the chain, EV charging alone yields thin returns.

But Sahney is clear-eyed about the opportunity ahead. "This value chain is going to grow. It has very good growth potential," he said. To get there, IOCL is exploring renewable power generation, battery manufacturing, and critical minerals refining and mining capacity.

An industry insider pointed out that since the utilisation is low, companies often shut down power at their charging points to minimise their losses. EV policies should therefore link subsidies to minimum uptime of the chargers and their performance benchmarks.

Meanwhile, Bhatt of ICCT noted that the profitability math only works on highways when charging is not a standalone business.

He took Norway as a case in point: charging networks there gained viability not on their own merit, but because they were anchored by adjacent cafes and eateries that kept drivers spending while they waited.

"The standalone charging business in Norway began making commercial sense only when EV penetration reached 25 to 30%," he noted.

In India, EV penetration for three-wheelers has crossed 61%, but for all other segments, including passenger vehicles, two-wheelers, and commercial vehicles it remains in single digits.

Consumer Worries

On-ground challenges rooted in regulatory ambiguity are just as common. Deepti Mallik, a real estate consultant based in Delhi-NCR, told The Core that several housing societies, including DLF Ultima in Gurugram, have been unable to obtain fire NOCs, as local fire department has declined to give a go-ahead for EV charging units installed in basements over safety concerns.

Notably, for short distances or travel within the city limits, most consumers prefer slow AC charging at home that takes anywhere between 6 to 12 hours and suits the fact that vehicles are usually parked overnight at home or through a workday.

Bhatt advocates for what he calls a 'Right to Charge', a principle that would ensure home charging is treated as a basic entitlement rather than a privilege subject to bureaucratic hurdles.

"A customer's decision to buy an EV should not be held hostage to RWA permissions or procedural delays in installing a home charging point," he told The Core.

Big Investments On The Plate

The government earlier allocated Rs 2,000 crore under the PM E-DRIVE scheme to support the deployment of public charging infrastructure on a pan-India basis.

The automakers are also moving with more intent. Maruti Suzuki has set a target of installing one lakh charging points by 2030. Tata Motors announced it will operationalise 500 chargers across cities and highways, together with CPOs, within two years. Mahindra, meanwhile, has signed a deal with HPCL to deploy 180 kW dual-gun DC chargers.

The ambition is significant. But in a sector where the gap between announcement and execution has been a recurring theme, how these targets translate on the ground over the next few years will be the real test.

Bhatia added that hardware alone is not enough. Mandating uptime through a reliable software layer, backed by performance-linked incentives or penalties, will be equally critical to ensuring that chargers, once installed, actually work.

"Without consistent charger availability, network expansion alone will not translate into user confidence or sustained EV adoption," he told The Core.

Opportunity Is Plenty

Setting up EV charging stations is an unlicensed activity open to private entrepreneurs, yet the government has set no specific roadmap or targets for infrastructure expansion over the next three years.

Meanwhile, India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), a government-backed entity, suggests there is an opportunity for the establishment of 1.32 million charging stations in India by 2030, requiring 4 lakh installations yearly.

At the current pace, the target looks distant.

Looking ahead, Monga noted that the way property developers think about EV charging is shifting. "EV charging hubs have been evolving from a liability into an asset, particularly in premium commercial premises," he told The Core.

Properties with EV-compatible facilities can now command a lease premium of 3% to 8%, he said, driven largely by corporate occupiers including IT firms and global MNCs with formal ESG mandates.

Battery energy storage systems are also emerging as a bridging solution to enable fast charging in grid-constrained areas and ensure continuity during outages.

For now, the public infrastructure is catching up, even though slowly and unevenly. As EV penetration deepens across Indian cities, the opportunity for oil marketing companies, private CPOs, electricity DISCOMs and housing societies to align is only growing.

The policy intent exists. The demand is building. What remains to be seen is whether the operational reality can keep pace with the vehicles already on the road.