San Francisco, Jan 11 (IANS): Elon Musk-owned electric vehicle company Tesla is using its "Tesla Engage" platform to ask its fanbase to support a new push to convince the New York governor and legislature to allow direct sales of its electric vehicles in the state.

According to the auto-tech website Electrek, in a post about the situation in New York relayed by Tesla NY Club manager Stephen Pallotta, Tesla argued that the state is behind on electric vehicle adoption because of its direct sale restrictions.

The automaker asked people to contact Governor Hochul and NY Leadership and express their support for direct sales of EVs.

As per the report, there are still some states that prevent Tesla and other automakers from selling directly to consumers.

It is due to old laws put in place to protect franchise dealerships against automakers trying to compete with the people who invested a lot of money into providing a sale and service workforce for them, the report said.

But now those same laws are being used to prevent Tesla and other new automakers who never had franchise dealerships from competing against dealers who sell vehicles from other automakers, it added.

It is being used in an anti-competitive way, the report mentioned.

Several states have changed those direct sale laws to avoid this misuse that gave a monopoly on car sales to third-party dealers.