New Delhi: Union Road Transport and Highways minister Nitin Gadkari’s approval of the draft notification to make N2 and N3 category trucks to be mandatorily fitted with AC cabins on Thursday means new trucks with 3.5 GVW (Gross Vehicle Weight) and above will soon be more comfortable for drivers. Not necessarily safer though, even as the new norm may have an indirect benefit on safety with drivers being less fatigued and so more attentive. Satyakam Arya, MD & CEO of Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV), the Indian subsidiary of the world’s largest truck maker Daimler, said, safety in trucks shouldn’t be left behind. In an interview with ETAuto, Arya said that the AC cabin rule is a “great step, I think we should do similar steps on safety also”.
India continues to see the maximum number of road fatalities globally. 1.53 lakh lives were lost, and 3.84 lakh injured, in 4.12 lakh road accidents in the country during 2021. Trucks were involved in 9.4% of these accidents or 14, 622 deaths.
The Government announced last year a target of halving the number of road accidents and deaths by 2024. It is set to launch Bharat New Car Assessment Programme (Bharat NCAP), an initiative for passenger vehicle OEMs to voluntarily crash test their vehicles to assess their safety quotient. Crash tests should also be conducted for trucks, according to Arya. “Why do we talk about that only for cars, why not for commercial vehicles? The life of a driver should not be different whether they drive a commercial vehicle or a car,” he said.
Arya said this with a certain sense of confidence in his BharatBenz trucks, which, he said, are built according to the European norm ECE R29-02, a crash safety norm for the lower part of the cabin till the lower part of the windshield. “We have not even mandated that, and due to this a cowl chassis truck (truck with only engine and chassis) is allowed (to be sold) and which is not safe for the driver,” Arya said. He adds that DICV took a stance from the beginning to only produce trucks with a factory fitted cabin. It is estimated that cowl chassis sales currently contribute to 30%-40% of the domestic truck market’s volume. At the beginning of this year, Arya said, DICV upgraded its Heavy trucks’ cabin construction to be in line with the existing ECE R29-03, which requires the entire cabin to meet the crash test norm.
Every intervention for vehicle upgradation, to meet new norms or otherwise, comes at a cost. So, doesn’t it make it a little more challenging to sell in a cost conscious market like India, if the upgradation is not regulation driven? “If you design it purely based on the initial acquisition price there, you will see a disadvantage. But if you take the total cost of ownership, including the cost of an accident, and a life lost, it’s a very simple equation. It easily justifies,” he said.
Citing the BSVI OBD2 compliance example, Arya said that while the regulation triggered a 2% price increase, the overall value proposition improved as the heavy duty trucks were made more powerful by 30 to 40 HP, and the medium duty trucks by 30%. Fuel efficiency of the medium duty trucks were enhanced by 3-6%
For the AC cabin norm, the additional cost would be in the range of INR 30,000, according to Arya. In his company’s case, 70% of sales come from trucks with an AC cabin. “Our customers came back and told us that they see much higher driver retention and motivation with an air-conditioned cabin. The incidents of accidents have reduced a lot,” he said.
With the market evolving, DICV would be betting on its fortunes also to improve. The OEM, with an investment of around INR 10,000 crore in India till date, expects the domestic medium and heavy duty truck market to clock growth of 7% to 8% in calendar year 2023, over last year. With that Arya expects DICV to have a record year in sales. Its previous best was a little over 22,500 units in the domestic market, and an overall total of 31,758 units (trucks, buses for domestic and export markets) in 2018. Last year, the overall figure stood at 29,470 units (including 11,000 units for exports).
