100,000 EVs, Just 109 Public Chargers — Did SL Buy Before Building?

Sri Lanka crossed 100,000 registered EVs by mid-2026 on the back of lower duties, but the public charging network sat at only 109 points nationwide as of October, with a handful offline on any given day. PUCSL has had legal authority over charging stations since 2009 but only started properly certifying charge-point operators from March 2025 — meaning most of today's network grew with barely any oversight on safety or pricing. One side says this isn't a real problem: most EV owners in Colombo and the suburbs charge overnight at home, so a thin public network barely matters day to day. The other side says that only works if you own a house with a private meter — apartment dwellers, renters, tuk and taxi drivers, and anyone doing Kandy or Jaffna on a weekend are stuck hunting for a working charger, often at a price nobody regulated. If you're driving an EV already: how often do you actually rely on public charging, and has a broken or overpriced charger ever wrecked a trip for you? Did SL rush the tax break before building the plug network, or is home charging enough for most people here? ඇත්තටම චාජින් පොයින්ට් හොයාගන්න අමාරුද, නැත්නම් ගෙදරදීම චාජ් කරන එක ඇති ද?