Up until now if you wanted to rent and self-drive an electric vehicle (EV) as a city runabout, the only choice you had was the Mahindra e2oPlus. But that equation will soon change as Tata Motors has joined forces with Zoomcar to deploy 500 EVs across 20 cities in India over the next year. The journey of collectively providing self-driven, zero-emission transportation options has commenced from the city of Pune with the only EV currently available in Tata Motors’ portfolio – the Tigor EV.

The first batch of Tigor EVs was flagged off from Concorde Motors in Baner. Here’s what Shailesh Chandra, who is the president of electric mobility business & corporate strategy, at Tata Motors Ltd., said during the ceremony:

“It is a great pleasure to announce our partnership with Zoomcar to offer shared electric mobility solution for the citizens of Pune. Tata Tigor EV will now be available on the self-drive rental platform, offered by Zoomcar, to enable zero-emission transport option for the citizens of Pune. We are confident that our customers will appreciate and enjoy the driving experience.”

Greg Moran, co-founder and CEO, Zoomcar, was also present at the flagging-off event. Here’s what he said in an official statement:

“The Zoomcar team is thrilled to partner with Tata Motors to bring electric vehicles to Pune. This marks the beginning of a dynamic partnership within electric mobility and we expect to touch 20 cities and 500 electric vehicles with Tata over the next year.”

As mentioned above, the Tigor EV is the only zero-emission product that the homegrown automaker currently has in the passenger vehicle space. Although it isn’t currently available for purchase, about 10,000 units of it were purchased by EESL to transform transportation for government officials. The state-run company had earlier planned to roll-out a second tender for procuring an additional set of 10,000 EVs, but that didn’t happen.

The Tata Tigor EV has a 3-phase AC induction motor which produces a maximum power of 41PS. The motor draws its juices from a 15.55kWh battery pack which, with a normal charger, can charge from zero to 80 per cent in 6 hours. However, using a recommended fast charger will drop that time to just 90 minutes. Tata Motors claims that the setup is enough for the Tigor EV to reach a maximum speed of 100kmph and boast a total travel range of 130km on a complete single charge.

Note: All the specifications for Tata Tigor EV were taken from a product note that was released in February 2018.