Bicycles and Bicycle Parts From India: Ludhiana, the UK Door and the Safety Tests

In June 2024 Jagdish Rai Singhal, founder of Ludhiana's Eastman group, explained to The Tribune why India's bicycle exports were shrinking. Trucking a bicycle from Punjab to the Gujarat ports added 10% to 15% to its cost, Europe charged Indian bikes 10.5% duty, and rivals in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the Philippines and Cambodia paid less. Put together, he said, Indian bicycles came out about 25% dearer in Europe (The Tribune, 13 Jun 2024 (opens in a new tab), Reported). Exports had fallen from 557,523 bicycles in 2022-23 to 436,720 in 2023-24, by the manufacturers' association's count in the same report.

Two years on, half of his complaint has been fixed and the other half has got worse. The UK now charges Indian bicycles nothing. The EU now charges them more. This page is for an importer deciding whether Ludhiana can build to their standard: what India sells abroad today, the duty in each market, the China anti-dumping duty that makes a non-Chinese bike interesting, and the safety tests that have actually caught an Indian bicycle. We publish no prices.

What India Is Good For, Honestly

Start with the numbers, because they change the question. India builds bicycles by the million for its own roads, but its finished-bike exports are small, under half a million units a year in 2023-24 by the industry's count. In the four markets we checked, India supplied between 1.5% and 4.1% of imported bicycles in 2025 (Comtrade, Verified). So you won't find a shelf of export-ready European city bikes waiting in Ludhiana. You'll find big domestic makers with export departments, and a much larger base of parts makers.

That parts base is the real asset. Ludhiana is described as making 92% of India's bicycle parts (The Tribune, 2024 (opens in a new tab)): frames, forks, rims, hubs, chains, freewheels, saddles and tubes. Our reading, which is Indicative, is that Ludhiana suits three kinds of buyer best. A brand that wants a simple, sturdy steel bike (city, utility, kids' or cargo) built to its spec. An assembler outside India buying parts. And a buyer who wants a non-Chinese source for steel components in a market with a China duty.

It suits a high-end buyer less well. Carbon frames, hydraulic disc systems and electronic shifting are mostly imported into India's own supply chain too, so an Indian quote for them is often a Chinese or Taiwanese part with Indian assembly. That isn't wrong, but it changes the origin question below.

Duty, Market by Market

We read the UK, US and Australian lines on 7 October 2026.

Sources: UK Trade Tariff (opens in a new tab), EU Regulation 2025/2146 (opens in a new tab), USITC (opens in a new tab), DFAT (opens in a new tab), and our UK, EU and US pages.

The UK row is the news. The UK duty on most imported bicycles is 14%, and the UK keeps the 48.5% anti-dumping duty on Chinese bikes and on bikes consigned through Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, Cambodia, Pakistan and the Philippines. An Indian bicycle with valid origin now pays nothing at all. That's the gap Mr Singhal was asking for in 2024, and it arrived in one market only.

The EU row is the opposite. The 10.5% he quoted was the GSP rate. The EU suspended India's GSP for the vehicles section from 1 January 2026 to 31 December 2028, so Indian bikes pay the full conventional duty, while Bangladesh, on the EU's least-developed-country terms, generally pays nothing. Check your own CN code in TARIC before you price, and check it with your customs broker if anything Chinese is in the bike.

The Origin Question You Have to Ask

This is where the anti-dumping duty bites back. A bicycle doesn't become Indian because it was put together in Ludhiana. If the frame, fork and wheels came from China, customs in the UK or EU may ask whether the bike is really Chinese, and the 48.5% follows the answer, not the label. Both the UK and EU duties already reach bikes sent through third countries for that reason.

So put three lines in the RFQ. Where is the frame made, where is the fork made, and where are the wheels built? Then have the maker's origin calculation checked against the rule for your market before the first container. The UK origin rule, the proof you'll need and how to claim CETA are on rules of origin and India to the UK. For a mixed-origin bike, this is a question to settle with your customs broker before you sign, not after a customs query.

The Safety Tests That Decide the Order

US. Bicycles are regulated under 16 CFR Part 1512, which covers braking, steering, frame and fork strength, wheels, chain guards and reflectors. The definition reaches pedal-assist bikes with a motor under 750 watts, and a bike with a seat height of 635 mm or less counts as a "sidewalk bicycle" with its own requirements (eCFR, 16 CFR 1512 (opens in a new tab)). A bike for children is also a children's product, so it needs third-party testing and a Children's Product Certificate.

EU and UK. There's no single bicycle law. Bikes are sold under the general product safety rules and tested to the ISO standards: ISO 4210 for adult bicycles and ISO 8098 for children's bicycles. The one Indian bicycle in our five-year pull of EU Safety Gate alerts is the children's bike Croatia banned in 2025 because the rear brake's force was too weak (Safety Gate, SR/00600/25 (opens in a new tab)). A brake test is cheap. A ban is not.

Australia. Bicycles sold in Australia must meet a mandatory safety standard, and the importer is the one responsible. We didn't re-read it for this page, so confirm the current version with your test lab.

What this means in practice: test the bike to your market standard at a lab you choose, on bikes from the production line, and test brakes and frames first. Indian domestic bikes are built for Indian roads and Indian buyers, which often means coaster or rod brakes and heavier steel. That's a fine product. It may not be your product, so write the brake type and the test standard into the specification before sampling.

Getting Bikes Out of Punjab

Ludhiana sits about 1,093 km in a straight line from Mundra, and that's the inland freight Mr Singhal was talking about (our calculation, great-circle distance). The town has a working export container depot, ICD Dhandarikalan run by CONCOR, and rail runs to Mundra, Pipavav and Nhava Sheva (CONCOR and ICEGATE lists, read 23 Sep 2026, Verified for the depot, Indicative for the routing). Quote FCA at the Ludhiana depot rather than FOB at the port, so the rail leg is priced and controlled in writing. FCA explains why, and the Mundra port page covers the gateway.

Ludhiana's other industry is knitwear, and the town page is Ludhiana knitwear cluster. For hand tools and sports goods nearby, see Jalandhar.

Back to Mr Singhal's Arithmetic

In 2024 the case against Indian bikes in Europe was freight plus 10.5% duty. In 2026 a UK buyer can delete the duty line completely, while an EU buyer has to add a few points to it. The freight is the same either way, and so is the work that wins an order: a spec written for your market's test, a clear answer on where the frame comes from, and someone who checks the brakes before the box is sealed.

Check your numbers in the landed cost calculator, and see the other India product guides.