Banning old vehicles is retrograde: Vehicle’s fitness, not age, should be the criteria for scrapping

Whether or not a car is match to run or in any other case, loads will depend on how nicely it’s maintained, its well timed maintenance; this must be examined as a substitute of saying it as unfit merely as a result of it has reached a sure age. (Consultant picture/ File picture)

On March 18, 2021, the Union minister for Highway Transport and Highways, Nitin Gadkari, introduced a ‘voluntary’ car scrappage coverage to (1) mitigate vehicular air pollution and (2) greater than double the turnover of Indian car trade from the present Rs 4.5 lakh crore to Rs 10 lakh crore in a couple of years.

At current, there are 51 lakh automobiles older than 20 years, 34 lakh older than 15 years however lower than 20 years, and 17 lakh lower than 15 years’ outdated however with out a renewed health certificates. The coverage structure is based on two pillars (incentivise their scrapping and disincentivise hanging on to those).

The proprietor going for scrap will get 4-6% of the ex-showroom value of the brand new car as compensation; 5% low cost on buy of the brand new car; and rebate on highway tax at 25% for private car (states levy this tax at 4%, so 25% rebate is 1%). The coverage moots waiver of registration price for brand new car bought on manufacturing of ‘scrap certificates’ issued in opposition to scrapped car. As for disincentives for hanging on, it proposes hike in price for renewal of registration (Rs 5,000 for a automotive lower than 15 years’ outdated, up from Rs 600) and health certificates renewal charges, stiff penalties for delay in renewals and imposition of the so-called ‘inexperienced tax’ by states on such automobiles.

All private automobiles should endure necessary automated health take a look at after 20 years to ply on the roads (for industrial automobiles, the edge is 15 years). In the event that they don’t go, these automobiles can be de-registered and impounded by transport authorities, saying these as ‘finish of life automobiles’.

Even because the extant legislation in majority of the states gives for re-registration of, say, a non-public automotive (run on petrol) for 5 years on completion of preliminary registration interval of 15 years, the coverage leaves the selection to the proprietor, in fact, topic to the car being match to run (relying on the health, registration could also be prolonged even past 20 years). Incentives/disincentives are solely supposed to galvanise him/her take a choice that strikes a stability between his/her particular wants and environmental issues. The coverage will kick-off with notification of the principles (anticipated in October 2021).

In the meantime, an order of the Supreme Court docket (2018) validating a Nationwide Inexperienced Tribunal (NGT) order that barred petrol automobiles older than 15 years from plying within the Nationwide Capital Area (NCR)—for diesel vehicles, the edge is 10 years—has put a spanner within the works. It provides rise to 4 anomalies.

First, the order negates the extant legislation that gives for renewal of registration on completion of 15 years from the date of first registration and takes retrospective impact. For example, an individual who purchased a automotive, say, on January 1, 2007, on the premise that she would have the ability to run it for 20 years (15 plus 5), i.e. until January 1, 2027—in sync with the legislation of the land—will now must junk it on January 1, 2022.

Second, it presumes that each one vehicles mechanically turn into unfit for plying after finishing 15 years. Whether or not a car is match to run or in any other case, loads will depend on how nicely it’s maintained, its well timed maintenance; this must be examined as a substitute of saying it as unfit merely as a result of it has reached a sure age.

Third, it results in patent discrimination of car house owners within the NCR vis-à-vis these in different states. Whereas the previous don’t have any possibility however to dump their vehicles on completion of 15 years (even when these are match to run and meet air pollution norms), the latter can proceed to run their vehicles as much as 20 years and even past.

Fourth, the order renders the ‘voluntary’ car scrappage coverage infructuous in as far as the NCR is anxious. When there’s prohibition on working the automotive past 15 years, the very point out of the phrase ‘voluntary’ is laughable.

The federal government ought to take pressing steps to appropriate this anomaly. It might both method the highest courtroom to relent; alternatively, it should result in essential amendments within the Motor Autos Act to replicate the coverage intent, i.e. utilizing health as the only criterion regardless of the car’s age for figuring out whether or not it may be allowed to run or not.

The writer is a coverage analyst
www.uttamgupta.com