The Indian arm of German conglomerate, Volkswagen has been directed to deposit a whopping amount of Rs 500 by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) with respect to a case for violating emission norms, media reports suggest. Volkswagen India has been directed to deposit the colossal amount within two months. The compensation amount has been raised from 171.34 crores by the tribunal as a means of “creating deterrence”.
Click Here For Latest News & Updates!
In response to NGT’s order, Volkswagen has released a statement which mentions that all Volkswagen cars comply with the country’s emission norms. It further states that NGT’s order will be challenged in the Supreme Court. The tribunal had earlier directed Volkswagen India to deposit Rs 100 crore by January 18, ignorance of which would result in a stern action against the management. Even so, the Supreme Court ruled that the stern action was not warranted on the German auto giant.
Volkswagen was first accused of the use of cheat devices in 2015, which helped its vehicles to pass the emission tests during the laboratory tests. The Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) discovered variation in the on-road and laboratory testing of VW’s EA189 diesel engine in 2015. Following this, Volkswagen announced a recall for its 340,000 lakh vehicles of its 13 models featuring EA 189 diesel engines.
The models that were recalled included VW Polo, VW Vento, VW Jetta, VW Passat, Skoda Fabia, Skoda Yeti SUV, Skoda Rapid, Skoda Laura and Skoda Superb. Aside from the above-mentioned models, some of the Audi models were also recalled such as Audi A4, Audi A6, Audi Q3 and Audi Q5. Last year, NGT brought the issue of recalling 36 per cent of VW vehicles to the table. The cheat device, as claimed to be used by Volkswagen is essentially a software that activates the emission controls of the engines during the laboratory test.