BY ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — In April 2016, Elon Musk invited Indians to preorder the upcoming Tesla Model 3. Vishal Gondal was one of the first to sign up, paying a $1,000 deposit for a car that never arrived.
The founder and CEO of a health-tech startup called GOQii in India’s financial capital Mumbai, Gondal wasn’t sure when the automaker would launch in India or how much the car would eventually cost. But the Elon Musk fan was excited about the Model 3 and willing to wait.
In the eight years since Tesla’s initial promise to sell cars in India, other automakers have launched their own EVs. But the American automaker has failed to follow through, apparently because of concerns that taxes would make the cars too expensive in India, combined with the difficulties of building an Indian factory if it decided to shift production away from China.
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