FUTURE IN OUR HANDS

Today India is the 9^th largest automobile manufacturer in the whole world. Annually more than 2.3 million vehicles are being produced. Gone are the days when Indians used to import foreign vehicles like Mercedes, BMW, Toyota paying heavy import duties of 200 percent. Things have changed now. Today India is not importing vehicles but also exporting it. India is Asia’s 4^th largest vehicle manufacturer. Not only that India is one of the leading manufacturers of small vehicles in the whole world.

In mid 1980s you could only see Maruti 800s, Ambassaders, Premier Padminis, Fiats on Indian roads. But after the 1991 liberalization policy reform Indian automobile industry has changed tremendously.

Now you can see big automobile giants like Honda, General Motors, Toyota, Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen have their presence on Indian roads. There is a craze for big luxurious cars. The per-capaita buying capacity of Indians has also gone high. Today even the upper middle class families are having more than 2 vehicles.

Now the major concern for all of us is vehicular pollution. Vehicles pollute the environment and are adding to the green house effect by emitting carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and other carbon particles. Statistics shows that India is the 4^th largest carbon dioxide emitter in the whole world. Also some the cities like Delhi are one of top 5 most polluted (air pollution) cities. Another big concern for us is that India is one of the leading importers of petroleum especially diesel, petrol and paying a huge price for it. Burning of these petroleum products in combustion engines is adding to air pollution.

Being educated and potential buyers or users of automobiles of tomorrow, it’s time for us to decide on alternatives for petroleum. We can use the latest technologies and innovation in the automobile industry like electric powered vehicles like Reva, Tesla, eSpark, hybrid vehicles like Mercedes bluetech, Honda hybrid, Prius . Get existing vehicles fitted with CNG, LPG kits as they improve the mileage and less polluting, stick to latest Bharat 4 emissions norms. Create awareness among people to use the transport system more effectively, initiate car polling facilities. It’s better to use small cars as they always give better mileage and burn less fuels. In USA (largest automobile manufacturer) ,people are abandoning big vehicles like SUVs for small vehicles. But in India the situation is completely opposite i.e. there is demand for big vehicles.

“The future is in our hands.Do it now.Create Awareness”.