The canary yellow Beetle, a 1948 model, is the first vintage car in India to be converted into an electric vehicle (EV)

On Monday afternoon, a venerable old “Bug” glided around the administrative block of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi. For a handful of vintage car aficionados who had gathered, this was a Bug — as the iconic Volkswagen Beetle is fondly called — that crept up a surprise unlike any.