Elon Musk postpones India visit, citing Tesla obligations

Elon Musk has postponed his planned trip to India, citing “very heavy” obligations at Tesla.

The Tesla CEO was due to arrive in India next week for a visit that was expected to include a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and confirmation that Tesla will build a factory in the world’s most populous country.

“Unfortunately, very heavy Tesla obligations require that the visit to India be delayed, but I do very much look forward to visiting later this year,” Musk posted on X on Saturday.

Musk posted last week on X that he was “looking forward” to meeting Modi.

He was also planning to meet leaders of Indian space tech startups during his visit, including Pawan Chandana, co-founder of Skyroot Aerospace, which launched India’s first privately developed rocket in 2022. Apart from Tesla (TSLA), Musk is also the boss of rocket company SpaceX and X, formerly Twitter.

Currently the world’s fourth-richest man, Musk was expected to announce an investment of $2 billion to $3 billion in India, mainly for building the new Tesla factory, Reuters and the Financial Times reported, citing anonymous sources.

His trip was originally scheduled just days after India commenced the world’s largest democratic election. An estimated 960 million people in the country of 1.4 billion are eligible to vote in the poll, which started on Friday and will take more than a month to complete. Modi is widely expected to clinch a rare third consecutive five-year term as prime minister.

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